Trump Virus: NYC, a friend, a book

— 12.18.2016 10:50 AM

A friend from my Calgary law school now lives in New York City with her family. She posted the words below last night. 

Facebook leaves a little white rectangle to respond to what people put up, but I found myself lacking any useful words. Since November, this sort of thing has been happening over and over, and all over. But I truly didn’t know what to say to my law school colleague. This was someone I knew, and that changed my perspective. (As did this, a few weeks earlier.)

Since November – when Hillary Clinton got three million more votes than Donald Trump, but lost – my world view has dramatically, dramatically changed. I no longer subscribe to that old political cliché, that “the people are always right.” They clearly aren’t. With Brexit in the Summer, and Trump in the Fall, the people are wrong, now, all the time. 

I no longer believe in the inherent goodness, and common sense, of everyday people. I now believe a surprising number of them are racist idiots. They’re fools. 

I no longer believe that democracy is the least-imperfect of the various imperfect systems out there. It is more than imperfect: it is a fetid, stinking mess. It needs fixing, but I don’t know how, or with what. 

I no longer believe that war is improbable, for those of us in the Americas and Europe. With Trump, I now believe war is almost inevitable. He’s already fomenting conflict with China, and he isn’t even president, for the love of God. When he is president, things will get far, far worse. Count on it. 

Anyway. In the little white Facebook rectangle, I thumbed out a few words to my friend, but they seemed (and seem) wholly inadequate. More needs to be said and done. But what?

So, I am doing one of the few things I know how to do: I am writing a book about the new world disorder. Two publishers are looking at my proposal. A prominent filmmaker is considering a documentary. I will let you know how it works out. 

In the meantime, all of us need to be pushing back against what my law school friend experienced. We need to fight it. To remain silent, as they say, is to be complicit. 


Comments (38)

Love for Justin Trudeau

— 12.16.2016 09:01 AM

…Angus Reid says our love for the Liberal Prime Minister has diminished, here:


And I guess my response would be: we may love him a bit less, Angus, but we still love him, you know?

What’s really happening, of course, is that the perilous state of the Ontario Liberals – cf., Hydro bills – is hurting the federal Liberal brand. For Kathleen Wynne, that’s unlikely to change until she figures out a way to lower everyone’s hydro bills substantially.  And I simply don’t know how she is going to do that.

Solution? For the federal Grits, (a) create a little bit of light between yourself and your provincial relatives and (b) start focusing on the pocketbook stuff. The ones who are doing well – Wall, Clark, Pallister – are the ones who are doing that.

 

 


Comments (16)

Punk rock makes for strange political bedfellows

— 12.15.2016 08:59 AM

Okay, my pal Brian Topp is coming home.  That’s good for him and his family, not so good for Rachel Notley.

Her new top aide is a guy named John Heaney.  Who is John Heaney, you ask?  Well, he’s the young guy in the picture, to the far left (typical).  In the centre (typical), wearing a dog collar, sleeveless homemade Sex Pistols shirt and snarling? That’s Your Humble Narrator.  The young thugs pictured? The prairies’ first punk rock band, the Social Blemishes.

John Heaney (who went to both of my high schools, Bishop Carroll in Calgary and Loyola in Montreal), I apologize for embarrassing you in front of everyone important in Alberta, but you should’ve stuck with punk rock.

cpxkreow8aa0axx


Comments (5)

Trump Virus: now in Newmarket

— 12.15.2016 08:42 AM

Here.

A young woman is left troubled and worried for her safety after finding three ‘alt-right’ propaganda flyers posted around the parking lot of the Upper Canada Mall in Newmarket Monday.

The woman, who is bi-racial and in her early 20s, has asked not to be identified by name. She works two jobs at the mall. She uses public transit to get to work and after walking off the bus at the mall stop near Davis Drive Monday morning, she noticed a white flyer with black lettering taped to a tree. The flyer started with the phrase “Hey White People”, before posing a series of questions to the reader about political correctness, diversity meaning “less white” people, stopping immigration and being accused of racism for celebrating a person’s heritage.

 


Comments (5)