Citizenship Study Misguide

There's an excellent article by Stephen Henighan in Geist on the increased militarism and blatant right-wing revisionism in the most recent edition of Discover Canada: The Rights and Responsibilities of Citizenship, otherwise known as the Citizenship Guide, the booklet that introduces immigrants to Canada.  I was similarly creeped out by it when I last looked at it, in January.  (It's interesting to know what my immigrant students have to study to become citizens.) Other highlights Henighan points out: Medicare is bypassed in a fleeting reference to the Canada Health Act; Tommy Douglas isn't mentioned; the CBC, government aid agencies like CUSO and CIDA, the right to unionize, gay and lesbian rights also vanish. The only two waves of political refugees mentioned are Hungarians who "escaped Soviet tyranny" in 1957 and Vietnamese who "fled from Communism" after 1975, ignoring, of course, the thousands of refugees who fled military dictatorships in Latin America in the '70s and '80s.

As I point out in my comment to the article, the arts are as underemphasized as the military is over-emphasized in the guide – on the one page dealing with Canadian culture, some literary names are mentioned, but all those pictured on the page are sports figures. The only performing artists pictured in the whole guide are an anonymous Prince Edward Island fiddler, and in another small picture, a bagpiper and congo drummer in an open-air market. There is one poem quoted in full in the guide: John McRae's simultaneously magnificent and sanctimonious elegy, "In Flander's Fields". Plus, of course, our National Anthem and God Save the Queen.

Consider the cover of the guide: two pudgy Canadians paddling on the Rideau Canal with the Parliament Buildings behind them, who, in their identical red life jackets and yellow baseball caps, bring to mind the Mackenzie brothers. Other images: the Canadarm (yup! always of service to our big neighbors to the south), a bemedalled veteran, a moose, tulips in front of the parliament buildings, a maple leaf, an altar piece bearing a crucifix (National Assembly of Quebec? not sure here).

As if that’s not enough, the Conservative government has also beefed up the presence of the military in the citizenship ceremony, with members of the military seated on the platform with the presiding judge, standing in the receiving line congratulating the new citizens, even giving a two to three-minute speech.

Overall, the portrayal of our culture in the Guide is not only out-and-out militaristic, but almost unendurably bland…and gives the lie to the Canada I know well.

Canadian Election

The NDP may have gained unprecedented power within the opposition last night, but that opposition lost much of its power as the Conservatives were able to edge themselves, due to the vagaries of our "first-past-the-post" system, into a comfortable majority.   As this analysis puts it,  they'll be able to ram through pretty well anything they want -- and expect them to ignore the fact that they still represent less than 40% of those who voted, and 24% of the electorate overall.

Some foregone conclusions:  expect no action on environment, wasted money on jets and jails, permanent consolidation of the corporate right as the Cons continue to cut corporate taxes, stock the Supreme Court with their own and kneecap other parties by eliminating their per-vote election subsidy. The CBC and Canada Council are, of course, vulnerable to similar crippling... expect widening holes in our social security net and economic inequalities -- and their related social ills -- to intensify.

Starting the year with a bang...

Churchtank Type 8 mixed media assemblage 2010 © Kris Kuksi

The Art of Warfare: more such arresting images here. 

Free For All

The American Supreme Court -- stacked with a majority of neo-cons by the Bush administration -- just moved to recognize corporations as political persons, quashing more than a century of precedent and giving them the right to unlimited campaign donations & political spending.

Now politicians will truly be bought as never before; to paraphrase one wag, some post office box in the Cayman Islands suddenly has vocal chords loud enough to outshout any citizen's coalition.

It's a sad commentary that here in Canada the CBC National treated this breathtaking development as one of its faits divers in the middle of its program.

To read more about this decision and its implications, check out this report and this column on Huff Post. 

Obama and others vow to enact legislation to counteract it, but, as this article argues, it will be very hard to do.

Fine Words

While Obama's Nobel Prize speech was beautifully turned, informed commentaries like this one and this one reveal inconvenient details that give his carefully nuanced blend of tough practicality and idealism a definitely hollow ring. Arianna Huffington, meanwhile, points out the obvious question that Obama left begging: how will escalating the war in Afghanistan make Americans more safe?

I'm sadly reminded of G.I. Gurgieff's description of modern civilization as "based on violence and slavery and fine words." Also what Tariq Ali said about Obama at the Blue Met last April: “Unfortunately, if you wear Caesar’s robes and put on Caesar’s crown, you have to act like Caesar. The previous one was like Caligula. This one is more like Claudius.”

Seeing red

Such a large (is it that large?) & vocal contingent that sees red when they hear the words "government" or "regulation" . To drown out their own ever-more ear-splitting cognitive dissonance in the face of economic disaster & obvious signs of climate change, they shout it out all the louder these days thru the blowhorns of Fox News, CNN, AM talk shows etc. etc. So loud they gain a kind of phony credibility -- so that the Washington Post features an op ed by who guessed it? Sarah Palin...

In case you missed it, here's Jon Stewart fleecing the onion skins off her + CNN et al. (For those of you outside Canada, it's Nov. 18, 2009 Clip 1 on the Daily Show site accessible to you.) I think he truly nails it here. Classic Daily Show.

Here's an article from the Huff post contending that Paul Krugman is dead wrong in his analysis of the economic meltdown. What the writer, Stewart "Bondad" Hale, argues is that while Krugman blames the introduction of securitization into the banking system for the debacle, in fact it's a perfect storm caused by a complex of causes including deregulation, poor oversight, questionable ratings, etc. It's an informative analysis, but I wonder if he is simplifying Krugman (who is no doubt simplifying his own message to make it media friendly) in order to "shoot him down". Seems to me Hale's claiming there's six eggs, while Krugman, half a dozen. Nevertheless, a worthwhile read to those of us in the dark about what many of these financial terms mean.

THE OBAMA WATCH... trenchant observations from Krugman

I can't help but agree with what Paul Krugman says here . His Blog, The Conscience of a Liberal, is worth following. I usually access it through the Huff Post, which I've been checking in on pretty well daily. I paste his post here because it will quickly get lost among the updates.

March 20, 2009, 9:05 am

AIG

Preliminary thoughts on the tax bill:

1. It’s not the way you should make policy — it’s clumsy, and it will punish some innocent parties while letting the most guilty off scot-free

2. But — there wasn’t much alternative at this point. And for that I blame the Obama people.

I’ll leave to others the question of who knew or should have known that the bonus firestorm was coming; but it’s part of a pattern. At every stage, Geithner et al have made it clear that they still have faith in the people who created the financial crisis — that they believe that all we have is a liquidity crisis that can be undone with a bit of financial engineering, that “governments do a bad job of running banks” (as opposed, presumably, to the wonderful job the private bankers have done), that financial bailouts and guarantees should come with no strings attached.

This was bad analysis, bad policy, and terrible politics. This administration, elected on the promise of change, has already managed, in an astonishingly short time, to create the impression that it’s owned by the wheeler-dealers. And that leaves it with no ability to counter crude populism.

MY "INAUGURAL" POEM

In a half hour, Barack Obama will be inaugurated as the 44th President of the United States. Elizabeth Alexander will be reading the inaugural poem. There's a good profile and sample poems at poets.org. I liked her work, what I read of it; consider Blues. May she rise to the enormity of the occasion.

On the day after his election, I wrote this poem, my first -- and perhaps last -- political polemic. I figured Now Is The Time (to echo the President Elect, and in turn, MLK) to post it. Some notes follow.

BARACK

I raise a glass to my TV screens, to this liquid digital on which I draft, this e-waste gold beneath my fingertips. Tinctures appear on the horizon, glints, facets…

…to this man of fine feature and earthen skin, whose name breathes Africa, whose breath is fragrant with the smoke and spices of Nyang’oma Kogelo, Wichita, Honolulu, Jakarta, New York, Boston, Chicago. At last, one of all of us! Intelligent, pensive, poised & sure … who speaks poetry, who knows the nuances of law.

May he truly listen!
May our ravening need be appeased!
May we stop melting our polar ice caps!
May we wrestle our economy from the reckless rich and return it to the people!
May health care be guaranteed for every citizen!
May war criminals be brought to justice!
May extraordinary renditions be canceled by this rendition!
May the guns that bristle at him not fire!
Now, may the real work begin.

– Nov. 5, 2008

What exultation, that day! Although polls and pundits had forecast the results, almost no-one could really believe it would happen until it happened. And I think the whole planet was taken by surprise, by the power of the psychic sea-change. (At least those in the position to take notice at all.)

Credit should go where it is due: A number of the invocations (from polar ice caps to justice, to be exact) are drawn from “Pinch Me”, an article by Michael Moore that appeared that same morning on michaelmoore.com

Frankly, I was very tempted to include this poem -- or rather, a previous version of it -- in my forthcoming collection, Passenger Flight. Something in me rues the fact that I chose not to. Political poems, though, have a short shelf life; by the time the book is published, it could well be dated or contradicted and make me look and feel pretty foolish -- although millions of people would share in that feeling.

I have every confidence that Barack Obama will be a great President. But, he could disappoint. Even at the time, I had this line, second to the end:

May bunker bombs emblazoned with Obama not fall on families in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran!

I felt truly uneasy about his hawkish pronouncements RE those countries during that campaign, although tactically, during that campaign, they were pre-emptive of Republican scare mongering should there have have been a terrorist attack. Like Michael Moore, I hope that this is a strategic campaign promise that is deliberately discarded as soon as it's convenient.

That line I've left aside because, well, it doesn't suit this day; besides it runs counter to the emotional thrust of the poem.

More later... the inauguration is about to begin.

****

I enjoyed Alexander's poem -- dignified it was, and lyrical -- although the response to her concentrated metaphors was understandably subdued. Perhaps the audience had taken in enough with Obama's inaugural speech, which had just preceded it. Some lines from the poem: "In today's sharp sparkle, this winter air, anything can be made. Any sentence begun, on the brink, on the brim, on the cusp. Praise song for walking forward in that light."

Rev. Joseph E. Lowry, the old civil rights activist who followed her with the Benediction, got a greater rise when he broke into an unexpected, playful rap poetry of his own: "Lord...we ask you to help us pray for that day when black will not be asked to give back, when brown can stick around, when yellow will be mellow, when the red man can get ahead man, and when white will embrace what is right." That brought a smile to everyone's face, including, notably, Obama's.

... back to my own poem. In a way I'm glad I'm not including it in my collection. Part of the problem with it is not just the sloganeering -- which irks me as much as it gave me pleasure to do -- but that I write as if I were American. Clearly I'm not. Obama is not our leader, and it is not exactly our economy; here we have universal health care. Appropriating Michael Moore's words was frankly an act of desperation, to finish what I had begun. But that I could write that way, and that the poem has been well received by a couple of (of course, small) Canadian poetry audiences and poet friends, reflects how we in what Jon Stewart has called "that weird sidecar of a country" identify with that charismatic colossus south of our border.

Much of the darkness in my book -- the focus on suicide bombings, the culture of surveillance, torture at Abu Graib, the decadence of the ultra rich -- was particularly pertinent during the dire Bush years, when all but one or two of the prose poems were written. It would be good to include, near the end of the book, something like this poem, to indicate, perhaps, that a page has been turned. But I believe it will take time to find language and a tack to authentically express my response as an international citizen.

George Elliott Clarke, who was kind enough to write an excellent blurb for my book, said to me the other day, "Politicians campaign in poetry, but they govern in prose." Now that the poetry's done, I feel the opportunity to celebrate the victory has already waned. It seems wisest to wait and see how the prose unfolds.

Michael Moore

One of many good articles about the Obama victory is Michael Moore's Pinch Me. This courtesy of my namesake.

President-Elect Barack Obama in Chicago

For the text of this remarkable speech, here's a link. Clearly, its high point is his narration of the life of Ann Nixon Cooper, the 106-year-old Atlanta black woman who voted that day -- and whose life encapsulates all the changes wrought over the last century, in particular the struggle of blacks and of women in America. Barack or his speechwriters came up with a stroke of genius with that one. Americans elected a friend to poetry last night. The world is better for it. Now, as has been said by many, the real work begins.

A little music for the day

... and may the best man win.

I like this ad, from Avaaz. It doesn't explicitly take sides, although the side it's on is pretty obvious. Its express aim is to counter desperate Republican fear- and hate-mongering (linking Obama to terrorists, spreading fears of Muslims, foreigners) as Americans head to the polls next week. One thing though: does the US have a good record of "standing up against tyrants"? I beg to differ. As a Canadian onlooker, though, my own allegiance is also pretty obvious: Go, Obama, go!

Noam Chomsky on Religious Fanaticism

Looking up Noam Chomsky (a friend informed me there's a lot of him on Youtube) I came across this quote on American religious fanaticism. It's transcribed, I take it, from a talk or interview given around 1990 (when the senior George Bush was in power). His insight is clairvoyant. I hope it doesn't become prophetic. I also like the presentation: Mozart's Requiem, the solemn, ancient columns.

BAD NEWS FOR CANADIAN BOOK PUBLISHERS

Canada Post is planning to double postage rates for thick envelopes. Effective next January, the cost of mailing a package weighing between 200 grams and 500 grams will rise to $5.50 from $2.25. The same doubling of cost will apply to smaller packages. Terrible news for Canadian publishers, used book dealers, small businesses that already operate on paper-thin profit margins -- and anyone wanting to send so much as a pair of socks in the mail. I can smell the protest in the air already.

... yet another Minority "majoritaire"...

The results are in: another minority government for Stephen Harper, considerably stronger in seats than the previous, even though he garnered only 1% more in the popular vote. I have nothing to say that hasn't been said (and probably better) by others, but here goes: Harper's Conservatives will, I expect, govern as a de facto majority, ramming through unpopular legislation as they did in the last parliament, as the others will be indisposed to vote it down and usher in another even more unpopular election. The Liberals, I expect, will be replacing their leader in the coming months, making them even more indisposed. I wonder if Harper will continue with those arts cuts -- it seems they really were a significant factor behind the loss of key seats here in Quebec. We'll have to wait & see.

Cultural storms

This post by Patricia Storms has links to articles by Margaret Atwood and John Doyle in response to Stephen Harper's arts cuts, as well as a nice bit of verse satire by John Allemang. Actually Allemang's point -- that the artists play into Harper's gambit by their whining about the cuts -- has been belied by recent polls. Paradoxically, Harper's oafish remarks have succeeded in making the rationale behind cultural funding a flash point in this campaign. Artists have been dignified and eloquent their in defense of the investment in our national image and economy this so-called funding represents, and public opposition, particularly here in Quebec, could be a factor behind his not getting his coveted majority come Monday.

Les coupures tuent la culture...

Protests against Prime Minister Harper's cultural cuts have made a much bigger splash in Quebec than the rest of Canada. Here the widespread unpopularity of those measures may just cause him to lose the province in the next election -- and hopefully, his chances at forming a majority government. Here's a video put on by famed singer-songwriter Michel Rivard which has had, by some estimates, some 500,000 viewers in the province.

I purloined this explanation from acidrefluxweb, who went through the trouble of making it. Says he:

Even if you don’t speak French, you should watch this as it’s very funny and mostly in English. I’ll guide you through it, especially if you are American as this is about Canadian politics.

Our Bush-worshiping Prime Minister, who we call shrub, i.e. a small bush, recently cut funding to arts and culture because it was for all those evil lefty folks. He forgot though that the impact in Quebec would be huge, as they depend on this for their own arts and culture, which is not only for more rich than English Canada's, but plays also huge role in maintaining identity.

Now in French, the word for seal is phoque. It is pronounced as fuck. So the arts people are scandalized by [Rivard's] first song so he says he will sing something else. In the song is petit, but in Quebec it is often pronounced as p’tit.

So once again the bureaucrats are freaked out because the think he’s singing about tits, and their conservative political masters would be very upset.

The rest you can figure out. 85% of the video is in English, & it’s very funny.

Spoiled Artist's Liberation Army

Check out this Spoiled Artist's Liberation Army response to Stephen Harper's arts cutbacks. Quite amusing -- and true.

WITHIN THE billions of sentences about the financial bailout there is one word notably absent, austerity. All talk is of payments, supports, subsidies, incurring more debt, stimulus packages. The thesis seems to be: If only we spend more the party can go on.