Neo-whateverism

Moving beyond the traditional blogging media of text, Devin Johnston hosted a Skype discussion with me and fellow new-dems NBCDipper and Sean Shaw about the Liberal Green Shift and the state of the left in Canada and I think it turned out pretty good.  If you feel like listening to it, here’s the podcast:

I encourage other people to either join up the discussion next time (I imagine it would be different guests too) or to start up their own thing too. Let’s give a VOICE to the Canadian political blogosphere, eh?

Well, after n-horizon.com has mysteriously fallen to the hands of domain parkers, I’ve transferred everything over to jfarseneau.com, including this site, so this is now politics.jfarseneau.com!

At first, it wasn’t cooperating, but after editing the database to reflect the change, it works again. Hurray!

Paranoia against “the West” (as if we were all some sort of united front against China while Euro-American countries can’t agree internally, how the hell are we supposed to agree on all conspiring against China?) seems to be the main line used in response to criticism from countries such as the United States against the handling of the Tibet riot.  I’ve criticized the CBC before in its treatment of China, but I flip the table now to show you an example of how the Chinese government shapes its propaganda by attacking CNN (not a news source that I like to defend, they’re rather skewed in their coverage as well, but in this case I make exception)

Exhibit A: Xinhua Article called “CNN, what is wrong with you?”
Click here for screenshot of the site, in case it gets taken down

Exhibit B:  The CNN Article that Xinhua refers to 
Click here for screenshot of the site, in case it gets taken down

Now… The name of the CNN article changed as it got updates, but you can see the picture. And if you look at the Xinhua version of the CNN picture, and the CNN version of the CNN picture, they’re completely different. Basically, Xinhua (or whoever responsible) manipulated the picture and pretended that CNN manipulated the picture to make it look like there’s no Tibetans throwing rocks at the car and that there’s a lot of corpses. However, on this side of the Great Firewall, I can actually go out and verify facts. And Xinhua’s don’t hold up.

Addendum:
Oh, and for the Washington Post one, you can check it out here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/17/AR2008031702578.html (it seems it actually did get the caption wrong, but Washington Post apologized: “[Editor’s note: The caption for an earlier version of this slideshow was incorrectly associated with a photo from Nepal. This version has been corrected]”, something I’m sure Xinhua won’t report.)

Now I’m not saying that some Western media didn’t get mixed up and used images of Nepali and Indian police cracking down with the headline “Chinese police cracks down on protesters”, but there’s an obvious reason why they have to rely on these pictures (which is horribly misleading and shouldn’t be done, I agree with that): Foreign journalists are not allowed in Tibet. And I’m pretty sure it’s not simply out of being so worried for the safety of the journalists (people who regularly go into war zones…)

Oh my God, does the NDP read my blog or something? They fixed it!

“Leadership for Middle Class Families” became “Leadership for Today’s Families”! Then the site, I think this changed, maybe it hasn’t, but it writes: “Pledging to make politics matter again for ordinary Canadians”
Then has a list: ACCOMPLISHMENTS FOR CANADIANS

Very funky. The video still says middle-class, but that’s okay, I can understand why they wouldn’t change that.

The previous post made me think, I still wish we had a “Social Democratic NDP” club to lobby inside the NDP, and one of its demand could be: change the language to talk to “Canadians” rather than particular classes and especially not to invented terms like “working families.”  I realize that that as Idealistic Pragmatic pointed out, it’s strange to have a “Social Democratic Caucus” inside a party that calls itself social democratic (well, half the time, the youth wings [and the English constitution of the NB NDP, as opposed to the French constitution that calls it social democratic…] tend to call it democratic socialist, and I’ve always had a problem with that as that seems to connote that we’re still aiming for that communist utopia at the end, which I certainly am not) but I don’t know.  Maybe call it “The NDP Third Way” and scare everybody off with all the bad stuff that brings up, like Tony Blair and fascists.  Maybe “NDP Reform”…  ”Progressive NDP”…

Well, this is a development in the right direction.  I don’t know how long it’s been like this, but I checked the NDP’s site today and it said “Jack Layton, Leadership for Middle Class Families.”  This makes much more sense than “Working Families” which I had ranted about before and a few commented that they thought it was a ridiculous term as well.  Now it’s become middle class families.  I’d still much rather simply “Canadians” because like, what about working class families?  Or middle class individuals?  I realize that most Canadians self-identify as “middle class”, no matter what their class is (unless they’re pretty rich) but still.Just wanted to chime in on that…

Okay, I suck at vlogging, but at least I try!  Anyways, here’s my response to the new beta site, in video form: 

Also, sorry, it’s 1 AM here and my roommates are sleeping, so it’s very quiet…  Also, YouTube wasn’t allowing videos to be uploaded, so it’s on Viddler for now. Oh, the new site, if you didn’t see it in the other places, is for now at http://newdemocratsonline.ca 

When I think of trade policy, my main concern is not repealing NAFTA or fighting the NAFTA superhighway. My main concern is going further with NAFTA (but compensating for its flaws), getting free trade (including free movement of labour) with the European Union, prioritizing free trade agreement negotiations with Asian countries (especially Japan, China, and South Korea).

When I think “trade justice”, I think of letting a select but wide enough number of African countries have free trade with Canada and they would have permission to still have tariffs on Canadian products.

When I think agricultural policy, I don’t think subsidizing farmers, I think removing subsidies and investing the money in education in areas where Canada can excel, as well as in city infrastructures to make urbanization a smoother process.

When I think of foreign policy…

On Afghanistan, I don’t think “Get out of Afghanistan!” I think, “Stay in Afghanistan!” I believe as a wealthy post-industrial state with an advanced modern military, we have a responsibility to protect all citizens of the world. Canada should strive to be a country that concerns itself with the world, not just itself. This means that as a nation we have to be ready to sacrifice our own to defend not only Canadians, but people around the world from genocide, human rights abuses and extremist governments. So in the case of Afghanistan, I would just like to remind everyone that the Taliban are fundamentalist extremists who have killed and will continue to kill to impose an undemocratic, religiously-discriminate system. If you think the social conservatives in Canada and the U.S. are bad, think how horrible they would be if they violently took over the government and modeled the government from laws in the Bible. Until the Taliban remain a threat and until the Afghan government is a competent force to deal with it, we need to remain. Once the Afghan government is able to ensure the protection of its citizens, to ensure the respect of human rights and is safe from religious extremists, we need to stay there, encourage other countries to support the mission and always improve on our methods to not offend the Afghani people by our armed presence and to sustainably contribute to the development of the country.

On the SPP, I don’t think “Evil conspiracy!” I think “Yes, continental integration is good, there’s gobs of things which are of concern to the entire continent and can’t be solved by one-sided one country decisions” Should we hand total control over to the U.S.? No, absolutely not, Canada and Mexico has to ensure that they the U.S. considers both of them as equal partner when it comes to decision making, but the prospect of cooperating against infectious diseases, help each other during health emergencies, further adopting a multi-lateralist strategy to North American defence, and make sure the lights stay on by pooling our energy ressources together with the goal of sustainable development, well, I rather like those, no matter how much it scares the protectionist nationalists in Canada and the U.S. And think about it, at least this way we get some say in American policy. Should it be done more democratically? Yes, and that’s what Canada’s insistence should be. So we shouldn’t be screaming “Stop SPP!” we should be screaming “Show us the SPP!” But the main idea, I agree with.

I want marijuana to be legalized. I want prostitution to be legalized. The NDP says not a word about it.

I don’t want more affordable tuition, I want flat-out free post-secondary education, like in Scandinavia. And don’t give me any of that B.S. about “paying teaches you the value of your education” because all those rich kids are getting their parents to pay for their education and graduate debt-free while all the poor kids struggle with loans and then get dumped 40,000$+ debts preventing them from doing anything like starting their own business or anything like that.

And I just don’t want action on climate change, I want a full out war on climate change. If certain countries want to miss the boat, that’s up to them, but I want World War II-style mobilization to fight climate change by transforming Canada into an exemplar of what the 21st century green society should be like. We should be investing in research, drafting bright minds to develop technology to fight pollution and then sell that technology to countries at an affordable price. This would give us an edge that we could use as a competitive advantage, while saving the world.

But all the parties disagree with me on all this. WTF?

*looks around* Well, I haven’t blogged in a while, and it seems I’m no longer on Progressive Bloggers… So it seems I’m safe to go back to rambling insanely. So, I’ve been writing down a list of policy ideas, the type of stuff I’d like to enact if I were in government. The problem with these is that I can’t really cost them, and since it’s a brainstorm, I wasn’t able to research them thoroughly, and yeah, there’s much more policies that I’d like to put in too, but I can’t remember them right now, so… Here’s the list I have up till now. Maybe I’ll regularly come in and change it. But yeah, I think with this platform, I’ve managed to piss off pretty much every conceivable group in Canadian society, making sure that I’d never really be elected

My Platform

Federal -

Governmental Reform
* Set up a First Nation House.
* Take the monarchy out of the swearing of allegiance.
* Devolve significant powers from the federal government to provincial governments, letting the federal government focus on defence, foreign affairs and other jurisdictions that are truly pan-Canadian in essence, as well as national standards.
* Pass the Canadian Well-Being Measurement Act

Culture & Arts
* Create CBC First Nation
* Create CBC Mosaic, a multicultural CBC featuring shows in a variety of languages with French and English subtitles
* CBC Radio 3 and Bandeapart.fm as FM radio stations to make emerging Canadian music accessible to primarily the Canadian youth but essentially every Canadian
* Set up stable funding
* Pledge the federal government’s support to the Canadian Museum of Human Rights

Taxation
* Remove income tax for the lowest tax bracket
* Create a new tax bracket, the over $150,000 of 35%

Defence & Security
Restructure the military fundamentally, by splitting it in two
* The Canadian Defence Force, tasked with the role of defending Canadian sovereignty, guarding Canada from attacks on its soil and aid in the joint security of North America. It would remain at home and not be deployed abroad unless of extreme circumstances.
* The Canadian Peacekeeping Force, a rapid reaction forced trained specifically for peacekeeping and conflict resolution which would also be supported by civilian experts in the fields of conflict resolution, reconstruction, governance in crisis situations and in a variety of cultures, languages and religion.
* A Peacekeeping Academy would be opened in Happy Valley-Goose Bay, NFLD.
* Setting up a commission to analyze the Canadian Intelligence Services and explore possible reforms

Foreign & Trade Policy
* Commit to 0.7% of Canada’s GDP to the United Nations
* Establish a free trade treaty with Europe, with the inclusion of free movement of labour so that Canadian citizens and European citizens could work and travel in Canada and Europe without restriction
* Make the development of Mexico, as a NAFTA partner, a priority
* Resume talks with the Turks and Caicos for it joining Canada
* Set out rules for the admission of new territories into the Canadian Federation
* Realize trade justice by removing tariffs from products from a series of African countries that meet certain human rights and governance standards, but allow them to put tariffs on Canadian products.
* Focus trade policy on four things: Reducing American dependency, drastically increasing trade ties with Europe and Asia (including Australia and New Zealand), and develop markets in South American, Carribean and African countries.
* Push for the democratization of the Organization of American States to be able to legitimately tackle issues that affect the Americas.

Environment
* Tax CO2 Emissions at a gradually higher pace
* Pollution Tariff, put tariffs on polluting countries
* Subsidize clean energy research and new forms of transportation
* Make a gradual shift to a non-fossil fuel dependent economy, give deadlines, strict deadlines
* Create a yearly “Green Cities” contest in which it will be rewarded with money for its budget, as well as offering money to citizens or new Canadians to move there, with a certain number reserved to people wishing to move from a “Brown City”, a list of cities with the worst environmental record

Social Policy
* Legalize marijuana, tax it like alcohol and cigarettes
* Crack down on illegal marijuana producers
* Legalize prostitution, but only within municipally defined “Red Light Districts”
* Provide specialized health services for sex workers
* Encourage unionization of sex workers

Health
* Set up a Pharmacare Act, providing money to provinces to establish a pharmacare program.

Education
* Establish an alternative to the federal student loans for post-secondary education and simply grant the current part of the combined national student loan program as a bursary.
* This bursary would be provided for a maximum of 6 years, unless you’re studying under an employment insurance-related program, at which point it’s not counted.
* Those relying on this program would have to sign a contract stating that they will work in the country for a period of time, with the exception of Canadian officials working abroad. This period does not necessarily have to be consecutive but has to be done before a certain age.

Economy
* Drastically scale back on agricultural subsidies
* Progressively scale back on oil subsidies

Provincial

Economy
* Create the Department of Development
* Establish four-tier zone model for New Brunswick: no-development zones, low-development zones, mid-development zones and high-development zones. Municipalities would decide where to classify themselves and the provincial government reserves the right to declare NDZs.
- No-Development Zones (NDZs) would be reserved for natural habitats, provincial parks, and other areas that need to be protected. This area would fall under the purview of the Department of Environment and Natural Heritage and would be tasked with the surveillance of these sites to prevent pollution, poaching or logging. Stiff financial penalties would be enacted for breaching no-development zones and the money collected would go to a fund dedicated to preserving natural heritage, the Jackie Vautour Fund.
- Low-Development Zones (LDZs) would be for communities that wish to maintain a calm existence. Development of big-box companies like Wal Mart, major corporations and fast-food franchises that aren’t headquartered in the Maritimes would be barred from opening store in the LDZ and also for a certain area outside the LDZ (unless the area happens to be another municipality) The Department of Development would prioritize subsidies and loans in LDZs to established traditional, family-owned businesses as well as new locally-developed small and medium entreprises. LDZ municipalities can also veto state-development projects (i.e., highways, hospitals) unless in an extraordinary measure, the Legislative Assembly unanimously votes to override the LDZ municipality veto.
- Mid-Development Zones (MDZs) are for communities that want sustained development but doesn’t want breakneck development, or that simply wishes to take a middle path between the restrictions of LDZs or the lost of sovereignty of HDZs. Subsidies and loans in MDZs would be evaluated by their own merit rather than any origin and it’s up to the municipality if it wishes to have big-box companies, major corporations of fast-food franchises from anywhere open there. This is like standard municipalities in the pre-four tier development zone model. Cities that haven’t passed a statute declaring their classification are by default MDZs.
- High-Development Zones (HDZs) are for communities wanting rapid economic development. HDZs can be asked to surrender part of their jurisdiction to the provincial government where it may or may not use it for special projects or economic experiments. Services and special incentives for specifically European, but also Japanese, Chinese, South Korean and Indian companies that set up in the HDZ would be provided, including translators, business help, contacts with embassies and anything else that is deemed helpful and required for them. The majority of loans and subsidies would also be directed to entreprises in HDZs.
* Nationalize the oil and forestry industry, in a state corporation called “New Brunswick Oil and Forestry”

Maritime and Atlantic Affairs
* Create the Department of Maritime and Atlantic Affairs
* Seek to harmonize and integrate other government services that could benefit from eliminating redundancy on a pan-Maritime level.

Security
* Creation of the New Brunswick Police Force, with the ultimate goal of transforming it into the Maritime Police Force with accord from the other Maritime Provinces
* Creation of the New Brunswick Financial Honesty Unit, tasked with finding corporate, governmental and individual fraud and tax evasion

Education
* From grade school to high school, morning exercises daily must be had for all students that can perform them.
* Schools must establish a uniform program.
* Families below a certain income level will have their children’s uniform paid for by the government.
* High school classes will continue until 5:00 PM. [Might cause traffic to be slowed down though…]
* Religion classes will be replaced by philosophy, ethics and logic classes.

Taxation
* Remove taxes on books.
* Extra tax on restaurants qualified as selling “junk food” until they rectify their menu to healthy options. Small businesses would be exempt.

Unions, Worker’s Rights and Business Interaction
* Review the New Brunswick Labour Code, with input from unions, self-employed workers and business representatives, in the interest of expanding the well-being of workers in order to create a healthy, pleasant working atmosphere to stimulate the economy.
* Set up a Union Social Contract, which would increase union rights and formalize their relationship with the government, but would also set up a framework of responsibilities that their institution would represent
* Encourage business to form “Business Groups” to represent their interest, and the government would privilege their interaction with business groups rather than individual enterprises. Interactions with business groups would be done in reasonable disclosure with related unions.
* Conflicts between labour and business would be encouraged to be resolved through Whitley Councils.
* Because the free market doesn’t take into account what is right and the government’s economic goal, found the Wage Review Board, which would rate the wages of different jobs across the province as “Too Little”, “Reasonable” or “Too Much” depending on the job’s responsibility, physical and emotional stress, and regarding policy goals such as gender equity and economic development. It would then have a series of sticks and carrots, incentives and disincentives, that vary on the degree of the change required and the importance of it, to influence wages to progress towards “reasonable”

Administrative and Goverance Reform
* Total Transparency of government departmental spending, with accessible, immediate, detailed access of every penny spent by what department on what
* Link MLA’s salary to the average salary of her/his riding.
* Implement Mixed-Member Proportional Representation.

Transportation
* Seek to integrate vehicle registration with the two other Maritime Provinces and Newfoundland & Labrador, to create an Atlantic Bureau of Motor Vehicles. License plates would be standardized except have the flag of the province in small, like a European Union license plate.
* Create a public insurance system for automotive vehicles, with premiums for hybrid and alternative fuel vehicles.

Culture & Language
* Pass a law that mandates that companies over a certain size (that would count as big enough) must have equal amounts of the municipality’s official languages in its signage, so for example, a municipality with English and French as its official languages would require a store like Wal-Mart to have all signs in equal amounts of English and French or else face a fine, that would be put in a Cultural Fund.
* Create a Cultural Fund
* Pass monopoly busting laws regarding media and encourage diversity of media
* Negotiate with Atlantic Canadian provinces to create the Atlantic Canada Broadcasting Corporation, ACDC, also known as la Societe de Tele-diffusion du Canada Atlantique, STCA, which would provide news on Atlantic Canada in French and English.
* Set up a permanent dialogue with New Brunswick Mi’kmaq and Maliseet
* Create the post of New Brunswick representative for the Mi’kmaq and Maliseet which would be elected by general elections simultaneously held in these communities. The representative would then be in charge of the Department of Mi’kmaq and Maliseet Affairs and be part of the Cabinet.
* Rebranding of New Brunswick
* Create the Cultural Renewal Commission, tasked with developing a new, vibrant culture including elements of Acadian, Celtic, Loyalist and First Nations roots but in a distinctly modern fashion.

Social Policies
* All hospitals classed as regional hospitals must provide abortions, protect the patients’ privacy and provide psychological help if needed at any stage.
* The Charter of Equality, which establishes the equality of men, women, heterosexuals, homosexuals and any ethnicity
* Companies that actively promote gender equality and ethnic equality will get tax cuts
* Any companies found to discriminate on the basis of gender or ethnicity will face stiff penalties

The Jeunes Patriotes du Québec, a group of unofficial young grassroots hard-liner activists for Quebec sovereignty, are holding an event that demonstrates the ugly face of nationalism. Beyond the warming embrace of a nation, nationalist seperatism requires a certain hatred of the other to sustain itself, for without an other there is no you, and the further apart you can push yourself from the other, the stronger your case for seperation is. Of course, in Quebec, sovereigntism isn’t unanimous and many Quebecers have fought against it. These people who refuse to share in this collective delusion are branded as “traitors to the Nation.” Sovereigntist figures in history are described as glorious heroes, while federalist figures are described as selfish, unscrupulous sell-outs to the “Canadians” (which is written in such a way, in English despite the documents being in French, in a context of disgust and otherness). Pretending to some kind of Quebecois unity of opinion, the JPQ writes that these “traitors to the Nation” are known as collaborators, or arrogant, self-proclaimed small-time intellectuals. But then, they ask, which is the worst traitor, so that we may remember them in hatred?

A list of choices is offered: Claude Morin, the couple Jean-Daniel Lafond and Michaelle Jean, George Etienne Cartier, Jean Charest, Jean Chretien, Jean Marchand, Pierre Elliot Trudeau, Stephane Dion or Wilfred Laurier.

On October 11, in a pub in Montreal along with a crew of performers, the worst traitor will be revealed… So that they may all get that vicious hatred out of them.

What a positive message, eh?