CHRISTMAS WISH LIST

A pox on all living politicians might be too close to home what with Covid-19 and all. I read in today's Record that our Republican friends south of the border have a gut instinct not to give $2000 to individuals and $4000 to couples as a form of Covid financial relief. Apparently their gut instinct is all about balancing the budget and avoiding debt and greater interest payments. At the same time these very same politicians have no problem voting in favour of $100 billion here and $100 billion there especially if it's for military planes, ships, trucks, tanks, guns etc. While the phrase pound foolish and penny wise hardly applies to either expenditure, you can see my point. It's all about choices. Citizens and voters, the buggers, often vote for the other guy when you give them a present but military contractors, being more appreciative, tend to donate money to the party and individuals that send contracts their way. Hey getting elected to Congress is expensive and don't you forget it. (They don't). ............................................................................................................ O.K. how about a pox on politicians abusing the current Covid crisis by surrepticiously slipping lumps of coal into Omnibus bills? Doug Ford certainly seems to have been converted medically (Covid-19) but not so much environmentally. Conservation Authorities have made lots of mistakes (eg. Grand River Construction Authority) but they've also reduced development in flood palins and helped restore wetlands and woodlots. Federally certain oil pipeline projects don't seem to ever die. Sure Alberta thrives on natural resource extraction but it is going to end and yesterday would not have been premature. Back to Ford it seems as if we never learn until it's too late. Our climate, due to human pollution is well and truly buggered and our water sources are just around the corner. Permitting more and more gravel pits along the Grand River and in other natural areas is just plain death by a thousand cuts. ......................................................................................................................... I would like to wake up tomorrow with both climate change and Covid in our rearview mirror. I especially would like to wake up and know that our elected representatives, be they municipal, regional, provincial or federal were going to stop lying to us. I despise liars and I despise professional liars more. What kind of a system is it when even democracy is all about lying to the public about almost everything? Yes there are hard truths that some people can't handle but the public have handled wars, invasions, depressions, pandemics, climate change, rampant cancers and still soldier on. It is the self-serving lying by both politicians and private industries that is the most reprehensible. It's all a game for them in which they lobby, buy and control politicians for their own financial ends as well as future control of the levers of power by both the politicians and private wealth. Democracy just like tyranny is all about manipulation and deception of the masses. "It's for their own good" style of lying when in fact it is solely for the increase in power and wealth of the already powerful and wealthy at the expense of the rest of us.