I tried to be nice. I tried to be polite. Now, they get Mean Angry Warren.
UPDATE: Aaaaand the social media team is heard from. They should be so timely before things go to DefCon One. Might remove the need for a social media team.
…so says Hydro and others. So, then, why are shops like Mac in Yorkville keeping the doors to their air conditioned premises open in this way?
Send along pix of more such firms. This is totally outrageous.
We’re pals, full disclosure, so I am happy to see Adam running. And I meant what I told Global’s Jackson Proskow: the only people who care about most of these so-called scandals, anymore, are the politicos and the media. Real folks just don’t.
Adam is a smart guy and a hard worker; I think he gives the Libs and the PCs a real problem in that by-election. As in, he could win.
In the coming weeks and months, as Canada attempts to comprehend the cataclysm that struck Lac-Megantic on the weekend, government and citizens will attempt to determine the cause – and assign blame.
So far, there have been suggestions that the runaway train that leveled downtown Lac-Megantic may have been caused by human error, or sabotage, or a mysterious fire. We have also heard, correctly, that transporting combustible materials at high speeds through populated areas is a probably a very bad idea, and that pipelines are less hazardous.
Given the immensity of the destruction in Lac-Megantic, however – and given the possibility that as many as four dozen people may have been killed when crude oil on board detonated – it is too soon to start guessing about what did, and what didn’t, cause the catastrophe. A sad procession of probes, inquests and commissions of inquiry will determine who, and what, is culpable. Rushing to judgment serves no one in Lac-Megantic.
But of the many railway disasters that have taken place in this country in recent years, we need not be so patient. In those thousands of documented cases, from coast to coast, one thing emerges – again and again – as a cause. It is cited a reason for hundreds of deaths, injuries and accidents, no matter who is in power, and no matter where the railway disasters take place.
Deregulation.
Over the past two decades or so, government has systematically withdrawn from overseeing what happens on our 50,000 kilometres of rail tracks in Canada. The result has been death for citizens and railway workers, damage to the environment, and billions in lost property.
A definitive history of Canada’s rail safety regime, written by a brilliant lawyer named Wayne Benedict, concluded as much. “[Canada has a] need for effective regulation of railway safety to safeguard the interests of the public and society, the environment, railways and their personnel,” Benedict wrote the U.S.-based Transportation Law Journal in 2007.
“The deregulation of Canada’s railway safety regulatory regime…making the railway responsible for the management of its own safety…has not, and is not, adequately protecting the Canadian public.”
To prepare his study, Benedict examined hundreds of rail accidents over many years. In particular, he looked at the major rail catastrophes that preceded Lac-Megantic: the November 1979 Mississauga derailment, which led to the evacuation of a quarter of a million citizens from their homes; the February 1986 Hinton, Alberta collision, which saw 26 people killed, and nearly a hundred seriously injured; and the August 1996 Edson, Alberta crash that killed the crew, and caused millions in damage.
In each of these cases – and in hundreds of others he examined – Benedict grimly analyzed the official response to the rail tragedies. After Mississauga, the Grange Commission urged that government needed to start inspecting again, and not just leave it “entirely to the railways.” After Hinton, the Foisy Commission declared that the “regulatory environment within which the railway system operates…is inadequate.”
Concluded Benedict, now practicing law in Calgary: “Trains are fast, powerful, often carry explosive or deadly poisonous dangerous goods, mere metres from our homes and our children’s schools…Parliament must move to restore rail safety regulatory enforcement power. It is time for government to take back the safety obligations that have been granted to the railway industry.”
Oh, and before he became a respected lawyer?
Wayne Benedict was certified locomotive engineer.
And it was cut off by a zombie attack. It’s been nice knowing you. Adios.
Here is what slowed down the traffic. Check it out:
The photos, and the stories, coming out of that Quebec town are truly astonishing. We should pray for the people there, and collectively push for a comprehensive investigation of the cause.
But after doing some research, I’ve formed some of my own conclusions. A taste of tomorrow’s Sun column:
Given the immensity of the destruction in Lac-Megantic, however – and given the possibility that as many as four dozen people may have been killed when crude oil on board detonated – it is too soon to start guessing about what did, and what didn’t, cause the catastrophe. A sad procession of probes, inquests and commissions of inquiry will determine who, and what, is culpable. Rushing to judgment serves no one in Lac-Megantic.
But of the many railway disasters that have taken place in this country in recent years, we need not be so patient. In those thousands of documented cases, from coast to coast, one thing emerges – again and again – as a cause. It is cited a reason for hundreds of deaths, injuries and accidents, no matter who is in power, and no matter where the railway disasters take place.
Deregulation.
Over the past two decades or so, government has systematically withdrawn from overseeing what happens on our 50,000 kilometres of rail tracks in Canada. The result has been death for citizens and railway workers, damage to the environment, and billions in lost property.
“There will be lots of blood.”
That’s what the Egyptian man in Cairo, working for a Canadian telecommunications company, has just said. “There will be blood,” he said, matter-of-factly discussing the fate of Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi. “The army will support the people.”
It was back in May, and the young Egyptian was calm, his tone almost indifferent, as if he were discussing the weather. “It is very bad, here,” he told his Canadian inquisitor. “There will be blood spilled before too long.”
A coup was imminent, he explained, because “everything” was bad in Egypt. Crime was rampant, and the economy was in shambles. There were food shortages, and lineups for gas. Inflation, division, uncertainty: Egypt, he said, had it all. The Muslim Brotherhood’s Morsi would be driven out of power by the armed forces, he concluded. It was just a matter of time.
Not too much time, as things turned out.
As the world now knows, my amateur Egyptian analyst was quite prescient: Last Wednesday, Mursi was deposed in a military coup — and thousands jammed into Tahrir Square, to cheer … what? The end of Mursi? The end of the Muslim Brotherhood? The end of democracy?
Because, make no mistake, it is democracy that has received a near-fatal blow in Egypt. Mohamed Mursi was the first — note that well, the first — democratically elected president in Egypt’s history.
However much he was despised by his fellow citizens (for his rank incompetence) or by Islamaphobes in the West (for his Muslim Brotherhood pedigree) that much cannot be disputed: Mursi was a democrat, and democratically elected. Now he, and his Brotherhood, will likely come to believe that democracy is a farce — and become radicalized.
Watching CNN’s Wolf Blitzer attempting to analyze the latest chapter in the Egyptian drama, on Wednesday evening, was comedic.
“This is a historic event,” he chirped, over and over, as if a military coup overthrowing democracy was somehow something to celebrate.
It isn’t, Wolf, not at all.
And, watching the throngs in Tahrir Square — where one goes (if you’re male) to demand political change, or (if you’re a woman) to be sexually assaulted by a mob — one could not help but ask: “Are the people today celebrating a military coup not the same people who were demanding democracy, in the same square, just two years ago?”
And, of course, they are. It is my Shiny Ball Theory of politics: Sometimes — and for no logical reason whatsoever, and not just in Egypt — people will chase after the latest faddish thing, and against their own self-interests.
Because it is “new.” Because it is different. Because they are unaware, or uncaring, that they are removing one yoke just to take on another (heavier) yoke.
Meet the new boss, worse than the old boss, etc.
The notion that the grass is always greener on the other side isn’t a new one, nor is it a uniquely Egyptian phenomenon.
But, watching the unfolding events in Egypt, we are reminded that it can often lead to spectacularly disastrous results. In a country of 80 million, with no single opposition voice and no clear sense of where Egypt is heading, it is difficult to believe that further bloodshed can now be avoided.
Democracy is imperfect, and, of course, so too are the Muslim Brotherhood and Mohamed Mursi.
During their short tenure, however, the Brotherhood and Mursi did not renege on the peace treaty with Israel — and they dealt with Hamas and anti-Israel elements with brutal efficiency.
Outside Egypt, it should be recalled that they were a comparatively stabilizing influence.
Inside Egypt, however, they were not. Economic and social chaos were Muorsi’s most enduring domestic legacy. In the short term, he and his Muslim Brotherhood will not be missed. In the long term, however, there will indeed be blood.
On that point, our young Cairo resident unfortunately has it right.
There’s good news and there’s bad news.
The good news: the Hot Nasties’ ‘Tribbles’ has been played by the Palma Violets at the biggest and best rock ‘n roll festival in the world!
The bad news: I haven’t done anything of cultural significance since I was 16 years old, when Pierre and I wrote that.
Try out our highly scientific poll! Do you believe that – despite the growing number of senior PMO staff who knew all about the Duffy-Wright dirty deal – the Control Freak In Chief, Stephen Harper, somehow didn’t?
Vote now, vote often! It’s more reliable that a Forum poll!