The City of Toronto is currently wrestling with yet another "budget crises". One of the programs on the chopping block is the student nutrition program. This program is to ensure that children from poorer homes have at least one nutritious meal per day to compensate for the lack of food provided at home.
So moved by the plight of poorer children in his ward, Councillor Doug Ford donated $1,000 out of his own pocket to cover lost revenue due to the expected cuts. Apparently he agrees that this is an important issue, no? Then why not stop the cuts? "Ford said he supports the student nutrition program, but wonders if it could be delivered in a more cost-effective way."
Ahhh. The old "the program must be wasting money" canard. Too much gravy poured on the whole grain bagel I guess.
Since the article helpfully provided the numbers, I decided to do some number crunching. The program costs about $12 million to run and serves 140,000 children. So cost per child per year is $85.71.
Conveniently enough, last night was grocery night in our household. Using that as a representatvie sample, we spend $272.00 per week to feed a family of four(!!!) Over the same 42 week period as the school year, that works out to $11,424.00 for a per person cost of $2,856.00. Wow quite the difference! Keeping in mind that the grocery bill is for 3 meals a day, plus snacks and other household incidentals like toothpaste, water softener salt, etc. Let's assume only 1/10th of that bill goes to breakfast each morning. Recalculating that works out to an annual breakfast cost per person of $285.60. Over three times how much it costs to feed breakfast to a child under the Toronto student nutrition program. In point of fact, if my family's costs to provide breakfast were the same as this program, it would mean that approximately 1/33 of our bill was going towards breakfast. That's a huge friggin difference. So much so that I'm now thinking that grocery store owners are billionaires gleefully fleecing the public. Time for Occupy Loblaws!!! I jest.
Back to the main point. $12 million seems like a lot of money, but we used how much money we spend on breakfast the annual program cost would be $39.98 million.
Still not convinced? Two bagels and a medium coffee at Tim Hortons is $3.81. If you only do that once a week for 42 weeks, your annual costs for one person would be $160.02. Five days a week? $800.10. For two bagels and a coffee for one person.
Feel free to play with your own numbers. But from my own calculations, an annual cost of $85.71 a year to feed a child 5 days a week is an amazing deal.
Thursday, 8 December, 2011
Monday, 5 December, 2011
Does the Education System Need a Check Valve?
I have had a long uneasy relationship with the Ontario education system. The further I got away from the education I received, the less relevant that education appeared to be. I tried to chalk this experience up to a personality quirk, and didn't dwell on it too much further.
And then I became a dad, with two sons entering our education system, and that has resurrected all my negative feelings and emotions all over again. I am going to have a hard time being a supportive uncynical parent for my sons as they deal with our elementary and secondary education systems. Twelve more years, only twelve more years, and then they're out of the system.
This article crystallized a lot of my objections for me (and also illustrated that these problems also exist outside Ontario's education system). This guy with a bachelor degrees, two masters and a doctorate in progress failed the math and reading components of a 10th grade standardized test.
I found these comments particularly telling:
Relevance. Every student at some time wonders the relevance of the material they are learning. Math was always the gold standard for relevance. We were told that everyone uses math, we use it every day when we go shopping, when we cook dinner, etc. etc. And then we learned things like finding the angle of a point on a curve or how to arrange numbers in matrices......
Since I've left the education system, I've rarely had to do any math beyond addition, subtraction multiplication and division. So that's what now? Grade 3 math? Everything else I learned, I never used. And then I started doing home reno work around the home. As with all homes, a lot of work does not involve 90 degree square angles. Finally! I am going to be able to apply that geometry I learned (and was pretty good at) all those years ago. The first time I ran into this I ransacked my brain trying to recall how to calculate the angles of a triangle. Something called SOHCAHTOA fell out, as well as the phrase Pythagorean Theorem. I was close, but after 15 minutes of hard thinking I finally recalled that all the angles of a triangle added up to 360 degrees. Wait.... umm, 180 degrees right? Yeah. I hope. Wood is expensive....
So I happily used my dredged up memories to plan, measure and cut wood to build a corner. Nothing fit. Damn it! Where did I screw up? Looking at the pieces of wood before me I realized that I was translating 2 dimensional concepts and measurements into 3 dimensional reality. Unlike a line on a piece of paper, wood has width and thickness. There is a difference between an inside measurement and an outside measurement. Son-of-a-bitch, I was never taught how to actually apply geometry into a 3 dimensional world. We abstracted 3D in the classroom, but that was always done using two dimensional tools, like pencil and paper. Covered in sawdust,swearing and cursing I rediscovered that there's a vast gulf between applying knowledge and having knowledge. Funny thing about this, that kid that dropped out of high-school and apprenticed as a framer or carpenter knows how to apply geometry to a 3D world. It's instinctive to him now. Me with my higher learning? I'm sweating bullets every time I cut a piece of wood.
This gulf is what some teachers will exploit when they announce an open book test. "Woo Hoo! I don't have to study! Teach said I can bring my notes and textbook with me to the test!" And then test day comes and the questions are worded in such a way that we have to apply the facts learned, not just repeat them. Many of us that had trouble applying the concepts learned felt cheated. All semester long we focused on reciting facts, and than bang! we had to know how to apply them. In retrospect this was probably the most important real-life lesson we were being taught. Since (in my experience) this trick was usually pulled at the end of the semester the opportunity to learn how to apply the knowledge gained was lost. I simply learned that I had to no idea how to apply chemistry to solve a problem.
While I eventually muddled my way through applying geometry to carpentry I did start to wonder how much of those 13 years in elementary and secondary school were a complete waste of time. Teachers poured thousands of facts into me, but like gas going into a tank, I just overflowed and a lot of that effort went to waste. I needed a check valve on what I was learning, I needed time to consume and apply that which I had learned.
As I have blogged about before, being in the IT field means that facts have an expiry date. Since every piece of technology eventually becomes obsolete, many of the concepts and facts that apply to that technology also become obsolete. There is no foundation to build from, that foundation is constantly being redesigned (often to the detriment of the structure built on that foundation, which is why many system upgrades to newer releases take so long, live say the transition form IPv4 to IPv6 but that's another topic). The single most important skill for an IT admin to have is the ability to apply new knowledge and discard the obsolete. Surprisingly, I actually have that skill. My test results from school would not lead you to that conclusion.
So here we are about to go into 2012. We're well into the supposed age of the "knowledge economy." My 7 year old son is being crammed full of facts in grade 2 that I swear I didn't learn until grade 4 or 5. The curriculum has been "accelerated" because we have to "compete" with the other smarter countries in the far east. He's doing quite well, as the school system measures such things, but he still struggles to apply the facts he has learned. This task has fallen on us, his parents, as we help him with his homework. He is fortunate that we (primarily my wife) have the time and patience to help him with this. But the system is still focused more on learning the what rather than the how or the why, and this frustrates me. We find we have to home-school to fill in the gaps. This will only work for so long as he will eventually hit material that we no longer have the skills for.
The issue with identifying the problem, is that I don't see a solution. Not one that doesn't require an instructor to pupil ratio of 1:1. Teaching how to apply knowledge is more of a master/apprentice solution. Something the trades do quite well. In theory the lab portions of science class were supposed to do this too, but somehow science labs just wind up reinforcing facts and how to follow instructions. So the system always defaults back to pouring facts into our kids, like they're some sort of portable storage device.
I do strongly believe that if we could somehow focus the education system in such a way that students applied knowledge as they went, and were allowed to follow those applications into areas that held their interest we would pump out many more students equipped to solve problems in the real world. Instead of thousands of overfilled gas tanks, we would have sleek high-performance vehicles taking on the challenges we face as a society. It can't be as impossible as it sounds, can it?
So while I try to keep my personal frustrations in the background, I will do what I can to ensure that my sons can apply themselves in ways they find rewarding and fulfilling. I just wish it didn't feel like such a lonely endeavor.
And then I became a dad, with two sons entering our education system, and that has resurrected all my negative feelings and emotions all over again. I am going to have a hard time being a supportive uncynical parent for my sons as they deal with our elementary and secondary education systems. Twelve more years, only twelve more years, and then they're out of the system.
This article crystallized a lot of my objections for me (and also illustrated that these problems also exist outside Ontario's education system). This guy with a bachelor degrees, two masters and a doctorate in progress failed the math and reading components of a 10th grade standardized test.
I found these comments particularly telling:
“I have a wide circle of friends in various professions. Since taking
the test, I’ve detailed its contents as best I can to many of them,
particularly the math section, which does more than its share of shoving
students in our system out of school and on to the street. Not a single
one of them said that the math I described was necessary in their
profession.
“It might be argued that I’ve been out of school too long, that if
I’d actually been in the 10th grade prior to taking the test, the
material would have been fresh. But doesn’t that miss the point? A test
that can determine a student’s future life chances should surely relate
in some practical way to the requirements of life. I can’t see how that
could possibly be true of the test I took.”
Relevance. Every student at some time wonders the relevance of the material they are learning. Math was always the gold standard for relevance. We were told that everyone uses math, we use it every day when we go shopping, when we cook dinner, etc. etc. And then we learned things like finding the angle of a point on a curve or how to arrange numbers in matrices......
Since I've left the education system, I've rarely had to do any math beyond addition, subtraction multiplication and division. So that's what now? Grade 3 math? Everything else I learned, I never used. And then I started doing home reno work around the home. As with all homes, a lot of work does not involve 90 degree square angles. Finally! I am going to be able to apply that geometry I learned (and was pretty good at) all those years ago. The first time I ran into this I ransacked my brain trying to recall how to calculate the angles of a triangle. Something called SOHCAHTOA fell out, as well as the phrase Pythagorean Theorem. I was close, but after 15 minutes of hard thinking I finally recalled that all the angles of a triangle added up to 360 degrees. Wait.... umm, 180 degrees right? Yeah. I hope. Wood is expensive....
So I happily used my dredged up memories to plan, measure and cut wood to build a corner. Nothing fit. Damn it! Where did I screw up? Looking at the pieces of wood before me I realized that I was translating 2 dimensional concepts and measurements into 3 dimensional reality. Unlike a line on a piece of paper, wood has width and thickness. There is a difference between an inside measurement and an outside measurement. Son-of-a-bitch, I was never taught how to actually apply geometry into a 3 dimensional world. We abstracted 3D in the classroom, but that was always done using two dimensional tools, like pencil and paper. Covered in sawdust,swearing and cursing I rediscovered that there's a vast gulf between applying knowledge and having knowledge. Funny thing about this, that kid that dropped out of high-school and apprenticed as a framer or carpenter knows how to apply geometry to a 3D world. It's instinctive to him now. Me with my higher learning? I'm sweating bullets every time I cut a piece of wood.
This gulf is what some teachers will exploit when they announce an open book test. "Woo Hoo! I don't have to study! Teach said I can bring my notes and textbook with me to the test!" And then test day comes and the questions are worded in such a way that we have to apply the facts learned, not just repeat them. Many of us that had trouble applying the concepts learned felt cheated. All semester long we focused on reciting facts, and than bang! we had to know how to apply them. In retrospect this was probably the most important real-life lesson we were being taught. Since (in my experience) this trick was usually pulled at the end of the semester the opportunity to learn how to apply the knowledge gained was lost. I simply learned that I had to no idea how to apply chemistry to solve a problem.
While I eventually muddled my way through applying geometry to carpentry I did start to wonder how much of those 13 years in elementary and secondary school were a complete waste of time. Teachers poured thousands of facts into me, but like gas going into a tank, I just overflowed and a lot of that effort went to waste. I needed a check valve on what I was learning, I needed time to consume and apply that which I had learned.
As I have blogged about before, being in the IT field means that facts have an expiry date. Since every piece of technology eventually becomes obsolete, many of the concepts and facts that apply to that technology also become obsolete. There is no foundation to build from, that foundation is constantly being redesigned (often to the detriment of the structure built on that foundation, which is why many system upgrades to newer releases take so long, live say the transition form IPv4 to IPv6 but that's another topic). The single most important skill for an IT admin to have is the ability to apply new knowledge and discard the obsolete. Surprisingly, I actually have that skill. My test results from school would not lead you to that conclusion.
So here we are about to go into 2012. We're well into the supposed age of the "knowledge economy." My 7 year old son is being crammed full of facts in grade 2 that I swear I didn't learn until grade 4 or 5. The curriculum has been "accelerated" because we have to "compete" with the other smarter countries in the far east. He's doing quite well, as the school system measures such things, but he still struggles to apply the facts he has learned. This task has fallen on us, his parents, as we help him with his homework. He is fortunate that we (primarily my wife) have the time and patience to help him with this. But the system is still focused more on learning the what rather than the how or the why, and this frustrates me. We find we have to home-school to fill in the gaps. This will only work for so long as he will eventually hit material that we no longer have the skills for.
The issue with identifying the problem, is that I don't see a solution. Not one that doesn't require an instructor to pupil ratio of 1:1. Teaching how to apply knowledge is more of a master/apprentice solution. Something the trades do quite well. In theory the lab portions of science class were supposed to do this too, but somehow science labs just wind up reinforcing facts and how to follow instructions. So the system always defaults back to pouring facts into our kids, like they're some sort of portable storage device.
I do strongly believe that if we could somehow focus the education system in such a way that students applied knowledge as they went, and were allowed to follow those applications into areas that held their interest we would pump out many more students equipped to solve problems in the real world. Instead of thousands of overfilled gas tanks, we would have sleek high-performance vehicles taking on the challenges we face as a society. It can't be as impossible as it sounds, can it?
So while I try to keep my personal frustrations in the background, I will do what I can to ensure that my sons can apply themselves in ways they find rewarding and fulfilling. I just wish it didn't feel like such a lonely endeavor.
Friday, 25 November, 2011
Knowledge Is Power
Quite the dustup on Twitter today over whether or not Peter Mansbridge's salary should be publicly disclosed. I came out on the side of the firmly against.
Emmett Macfarlane surprised me when he tweeted: "I am in favour of a 'sunshine' list for the entire fed govt, just like Ontario's." and quickly countered my reply with "People arguing a sunshine list doesn't "do" anything. Transparency is an end in itself"
I don't agree that Transparency is in and of itself a public good. Whenever the public desires transparency it does need extra justification. In the case of personal information I firmly believe (to paraphrase Carl Sagan) that extraordinary claims to individuals' private data requires extraordinary proof of public good.
When it comes to the individual salaries of public sector employees, I do not see any public value or public good in having that knowledge. The problem with a salary is that it is highly subjective. Many factors dictate what an employee is worth including skills, length of service, market employee works in, rarity or demand for skills and execution of said skills. That's a small part of a much bigger list. These and many other factors are what dictate the salaries managers approve for their employees. This is why CBC hires managers, they are specialists in this area. Do you have equal knowledge and ability as CBC management and as such are qualified to second guess their decisions? I highly doubt it.
If we want to know the salary of Peter Mansbridge, for that knowledge to have meaning we would need to know the justifications managers used for that salary. Otherwise it is just a number. A big number that is likely quite large in comparison to the majority of Canadians. But that would be true for any anchor of a national news broadcast. So why would we need to only know Peter Mansbridge's salary and none of his peers in the private sector? If we were to know his salary what would we do with that knowledge?
Knowing someone's salary gives you power over that individual. Like any power, it should be used for good, for the betterment of all. When it comes to salaries, I just don't trust society to be responsible with that knowledge. We are a vain, petty, jealous, vicious species and when it comes to money all our worst traits come to the fore.
But even if we were pure of intent and purpose, what does that knowledge give us? What would it change or enable? I honestly cannot think of a thing. Feel free to prospose something in the comments. Expand my knowledge here because I am drawing a complete blank. This is why I feel that such knowledge would be abused. When positives are absent, negative consequences will abound.
As voters we do have a right to know how well our tax dollars are being spent. But that can only be done through comparitive analysis with similar private sector organizations. Does the CBC have significantly higher or lower mangement costs than private interests such as CTV, Global, etc.? That knowledge has value as it offers an opportunity to weigh the investment being made. But that valuation is done not with individual salary data, but through the aggregate of all expenses. Simply put, to evaluate the worth of CBC, we evaluate the CBC as a whole, not by micromanaging individual salaries.
So if you still believe that as a taxpayer you are entitled to know the salaries of public sector employees, please explain why you believe that and what you would do with that knowledge and power. The answer "Because that is my money" doesn't cut it. It isn't your money anymore, it ceased to be yours the moment the government collected it.
Give me the extraordinary evidence that such knowledge is a public good.
Emmett Macfarlane surprised me when he tweeted: "I am in favour of a 'sunshine' list for the entire fed govt, just like Ontario's." and quickly countered my reply with "People arguing a sunshine list doesn't "do" anything. Transparency is an end in itself"
I don't agree that Transparency is in and of itself a public good. Whenever the public desires transparency it does need extra justification. In the case of personal information I firmly believe (to paraphrase Carl Sagan) that extraordinary claims to individuals' private data requires extraordinary proof of public good.
When it comes to the individual salaries of public sector employees, I do not see any public value or public good in having that knowledge. The problem with a salary is that it is highly subjective. Many factors dictate what an employee is worth including skills, length of service, market employee works in, rarity or demand for skills and execution of said skills. That's a small part of a much bigger list. These and many other factors are what dictate the salaries managers approve for their employees. This is why CBC hires managers, they are specialists in this area. Do you have equal knowledge and ability as CBC management and as such are qualified to second guess their decisions? I highly doubt it.
If we want to know the salary of Peter Mansbridge, for that knowledge to have meaning we would need to know the justifications managers used for that salary. Otherwise it is just a number. A big number that is likely quite large in comparison to the majority of Canadians. But that would be true for any anchor of a national news broadcast. So why would we need to only know Peter Mansbridge's salary and none of his peers in the private sector? If we were to know his salary what would we do with that knowledge?
Knowing someone's salary gives you power over that individual. Like any power, it should be used for good, for the betterment of all. When it comes to salaries, I just don't trust society to be responsible with that knowledge. We are a vain, petty, jealous, vicious species and when it comes to money all our worst traits come to the fore.
But even if we were pure of intent and purpose, what does that knowledge give us? What would it change or enable? I honestly cannot think of a thing. Feel free to prospose something in the comments. Expand my knowledge here because I am drawing a complete blank. This is why I feel that such knowledge would be abused. When positives are absent, negative consequences will abound.
As voters we do have a right to know how well our tax dollars are being spent. But that can only be done through comparitive analysis with similar private sector organizations. Does the CBC have significantly higher or lower mangement costs than private interests such as CTV, Global, etc.? That knowledge has value as it offers an opportunity to weigh the investment being made. But that valuation is done not with individual salary data, but through the aggregate of all expenses. Simply put, to evaluate the worth of CBC, we evaluate the CBC as a whole, not by micromanaging individual salaries.
So if you still believe that as a taxpayer you are entitled to know the salaries of public sector employees, please explain why you believe that and what you would do with that knowledge and power. The answer "Because that is my money" doesn't cut it. It isn't your money anymore, it ceased to be yours the moment the government collected it.
Give me the extraordinary evidence that such knowledge is a public good.
Monday, 14 November, 2011
Microsoft LiveID Account Verification Fail
As a Microsoft License administrator for our company, I need to create a LiveID account to access our license agreements. So I started down that path, got stuck at the LiveID password reset option (which is mandatory). In order to create an account, I have to select a Question Answer combo that I have to correctly reply to in case I need my password reset.
These are the available questions:
1) I don't know my Mother's birthplace. Scratch that option.
2) Best childhood friend. I had a bunch, no one name is more memorable than any other. If I pick one, 5 years from now I can't be certain I would pick that name again.
3) Name of first pet. Ah! That was Shep.
Not accepted. The answer provided must be 5 characters long. Minimum. S-h-e-p 1-2-3-4 Oh for F#@$ Sakes!!!!
4) Favorite teacher. Didn't have one. If I did, it was Mrs. Whats-her-name.
5) Favorite historical person. Seriously Microsoft? How many people have a "Favorite historical person"? I suspect if you do, you have a list of them, so same problem as with Best childhood friend.
6) Grandfather's occupation. I know that one! He was a Cook! C-o-o-k. 4 Characters. Shit!!!! OK how about Chef? AAARRRGGGGGHHHHH!!!!
I'm at the point where I have to pick one of the questions, make up an answer AND WRITE IT DOWN SOMEWHERE FOR EASY RETRIEVAL BECAUSE I WILL NOT REMEMBER IT. So I just defeated the purpose of picking a strong password earlier in the sign-up form. The irony is so painful it hurts.
*SIGH* If I could find the person that designed/approved this form I would kick them really, really hard in the shins. Twice.
These are the available questions:
2) Best childhood friend. I had a bunch, no one name is more memorable than any other. If I pick one, 5 years from now I can't be certain I would pick that name again.
3) Name of first pet. Ah! That was Shep.
Not accepted. The answer provided must be 5 characters long. Minimum. S-h-e-p 1-2-3-4 Oh for F#@$ Sakes!!!!
4) Favorite teacher. Didn't have one. If I did, it was Mrs. Whats-her-name.
5) Favorite historical person. Seriously Microsoft? How many people have a "Favorite historical person"? I suspect if you do, you have a list of them, so same problem as with Best childhood friend.
6) Grandfather's occupation. I know that one! He was a Cook! C-o-o-k. 4 Characters. Shit!!!! OK how about Chef? AAARRRGGGGGHHHHH!!!!
I'm at the point where I have to pick one of the questions, make up an answer AND WRITE IT DOWN SOMEWHERE FOR EASY RETRIEVAL BECAUSE I WILL NOT REMEMBER IT. So I just defeated the purpose of picking a strong password earlier in the sign-up form. The irony is so painful it hurts.
*SIGH* If I could find the person that designed/approved this form I would kick them really, really hard in the shins. Twice.
Wednesday, 9 November, 2011
No Gmail App for Blackberry? No problem!
So today the panic hit when Google announced they were ending development and the availability of the Gmail App for Blackberry. The information conveyed so far implied that Blackberry users were left with only one option, the Web only interface.
I use Gmail on my Blackberry, so this announcement concerned me a wee bit. What confused me (and Chris) is that the Blackberry already has native integration with Gmail. I never installed the Gmail app on my Blackberry as I was able to setup my account through the built-in Blackberry e-mail account management application. My concern was that this native support was the "app" that Google was ending support for.
So I sat down, found and installed the Gmail app for Blackberry and detemined that it offers little more functionality than what Blackberry offers natively. Google providing their own app is entirely superfluous and unnecessary.
Phew! What a relief. I can keep my current Gmail setup and not be affected by this announcement at all.
So to cut through the hysteria out there. On a Blackberry it is not Gmail App or Web interface only, the Blackberry already integrates with Gmail natively, just like it does for all e-mail account types. This feature is not going away.
On this announcement at least, Blackberry users can sigh in relief as it is almost entirely irrelevant.
I use Gmail on my Blackberry, so this announcement concerned me a wee bit. What confused me (and Chris) is that the Blackberry already has native integration with Gmail. I never installed the Gmail app on my Blackberry as I was able to setup my account through the built-in Blackberry e-mail account management application. My concern was that this native support was the "app" that Google was ending support for.
So I sat down, found and installed the Gmail app for Blackberry and detemined that it offers little more functionality than what Blackberry offers natively. Google providing their own app is entirely superfluous and unnecessary.
Phew! What a relief. I can keep my current Gmail setup and not be affected by this announcement at all.
So to cut through the hysteria out there. On a Blackberry it is not Gmail App or Web interface only, the Blackberry already integrates with Gmail natively, just like it does for all e-mail account types. This feature is not going away.
On this announcement at least, Blackberry users can sigh in relief as it is almost entirely irrelevant.
Monday, 17 October, 2011
The 99-99-99 Issue
While my sympathies lie with the Occupy Some Street protests happening world wide, I ain't entirely behind them either.
I do agree that the growing wealth divide in the West, including Canada, is an issue. I also do not have a problem with the lack of a coherent voice out of the movement. Criticisms that it doesn't have a coherent point are offside as far as I am concerned. More on that later...
I have also read some criticism that the '99%s' are partly responsible for the current debt crunch because they chose to overextend themselves with bad credit decisions. That argument has merit EXCEPT WHEN BANK EXECS APPROVED SHITLOADS OF BAD LOANS, DAMN NEAR BURIED EVERY MAJOR BANK IN THE WESTERN WORLD, GOT TAXPAYER BAILOUTS AND THEN PAID THEMSELVES MASSIVE BONUSES. Holy Flea Bitten Goats! If we have to take responsibility for the consequences of our own actions, why by all the rules of fairness and accountability did the bank execs not have to take the same level of responsibility? Come on! Responsibility for consequences has to be universal, otherwise fuck off when telling me I have to take responsibility for my actions. I argued earlier when this whole crises was unfolding that if consumer debt failures were causing the crises then bailout the homeowners, not the banks holding the loans. As far as I'm concerned, with the way the banks took the money and ran, I was proven right with that idea. (And to her credit Hillary Clinton was on-board with that idea too.)
So the bank bailouts, more than anything else, is fuelling the fire of the current protests (In my opinion). From that the anger has boiled over to other aspects of our daily lives, and this is where the inspiration for the title of my post came from. Currently it feels like 99% of us are affected by 99 problems that are each needing 99 solutions. With that much going on, it is impossible for one single message to dominate these protests. (Yeah the title is also a smack-down of the stupid simplistic nonsense coming from Herman Cain).
People are angry, and I get that, I get pretty pissed myself at times. In fact, I feel like I've been in a permanent pissed off state for the last 8 years or so. So why am I not right down there with the protesters? Because I feel at this moment their solutions are too simplistic for the problems we are facing.
Part of my problem is I am living proof that none-union employees are doing OK. For 12 years running my employers (often to my surprise) have kept my raises above the cost of living. Our family has finally, after 15 long years, crested that hill of financial stability. We made sacrifices, worked hard and we're making it. We're a success.
We have also had an unfair amount of damned good luck too. I'll take it, but I admit a lot of our success was due to luck and unforeseen good timing.
That's why I do not buy into the "it's your own damned fault you're not successful." Success takes hard work and good luck, hell, there are people where luck is entirely the source of their success (Kim Kardashian anyone?) Even for us, it wouldn't take much bad luck to push us back down the wrong side of that hill. To claim hard work alone will grant you success is the ultimate lie we tell ourselves.
We in the West have unparalleled levels of wealth, even in the stressed out over extended middle class. Multiple cars, multiple PCs, TVs, large houses, multiple appliances, video game systems, etc. etc. Part of me wishes this 99% debate would re-evaluate what it is to be wealthy (there's probably some back-to-the-stone-age type thinkers in the mix I do not doubt). There's a dark jealousy aspect that bothers me. That being said, the way the top 1% are accumulating wealth at an unimaginable rate is just nauseating. And the numbers back up the notion that everyone else's income levels are not growing at the same rate.
There have been some interesting suggestions around wealth distribution policies (higher VATs, guaranteed supplemented base income are two), I think those are serious policy options that need to be fleshed out and debated/implemented. But there's a lot of shouting going on right now that drowns out these incremental measures to get us back on the right track. Fix things now! seems to be the message out there, and that just ain't gonna happen.
But what holds me back the most; I have this very strong innate doubt that the Western capitalist model is sustainable. There are just not enough resources to go around. To abuse the Titanic metaphor, we're not just rearranging the deck chairs, there are also just not enough life boats to go around.
Economy, civil rights, environment. Each has multiple seemingly insurmountable issues. When faced with problems that are complex we are told to break them down into manageable components and deal with them one at a time. But doesn't it feel that these issues are too intertwined, the effects are compounding quickly and we just don't have the time to deal with them all?
Maybe our only option is a collective expression of disgust of where we are and where we are going. So no, I'm not saying stop protesting. Use your voices, try to make a difference, because in the end something does have to change.
I just wish I could put my finger exactly on what that change needs to be.
I do agree that the growing wealth divide in the West, including Canada, is an issue. I also do not have a problem with the lack of a coherent voice out of the movement. Criticisms that it doesn't have a coherent point are offside as far as I am concerned. More on that later...
I have also read some criticism that the '99%s' are partly responsible for the current debt crunch because they chose to overextend themselves with bad credit decisions. That argument has merit EXCEPT WHEN BANK EXECS APPROVED SHITLOADS OF BAD LOANS, DAMN NEAR BURIED EVERY MAJOR BANK IN THE WESTERN WORLD, GOT TAXPAYER BAILOUTS AND THEN PAID THEMSELVES MASSIVE BONUSES. Holy Flea Bitten Goats! If we have to take responsibility for the consequences of our own actions, why by all the rules of fairness and accountability did the bank execs not have to take the same level of responsibility? Come on! Responsibility for consequences has to be universal, otherwise fuck off when telling me I have to take responsibility for my actions. I argued earlier when this whole crises was unfolding that if consumer debt failures were causing the crises then bailout the homeowners, not the banks holding the loans. As far as I'm concerned, with the way the banks took the money and ran, I was proven right with that idea. (And to her credit Hillary Clinton was on-board with that idea too.)
So the bank bailouts, more than anything else, is fuelling the fire of the current protests (In my opinion). From that the anger has boiled over to other aspects of our daily lives, and this is where the inspiration for the title of my post came from. Currently it feels like 99% of us are affected by 99 problems that are each needing 99 solutions. With that much going on, it is impossible for one single message to dominate these protests. (Yeah the title is also a smack-down of the stupid simplistic nonsense coming from Herman Cain).
People are angry, and I get that, I get pretty pissed myself at times. In fact, I feel like I've been in a permanent pissed off state for the last 8 years or so. So why am I not right down there with the protesters? Because I feel at this moment their solutions are too simplistic for the problems we are facing.
Part of my problem is I am living proof that none-union employees are doing OK. For 12 years running my employers (often to my surprise) have kept my raises above the cost of living. Our family has finally, after 15 long years, crested that hill of financial stability. We made sacrifices, worked hard and we're making it. We're a success.
We have also had an unfair amount of damned good luck too. I'll take it, but I admit a lot of our success was due to luck and unforeseen good timing.
That's why I do not buy into the "it's your own damned fault you're not successful." Success takes hard work and good luck, hell, there are people where luck is entirely the source of their success (Kim Kardashian anyone?) Even for us, it wouldn't take much bad luck to push us back down the wrong side of that hill. To claim hard work alone will grant you success is the ultimate lie we tell ourselves.
We in the West have unparalleled levels of wealth, even in the stressed out over extended middle class. Multiple cars, multiple PCs, TVs, large houses, multiple appliances, video game systems, etc. etc. Part of me wishes this 99% debate would re-evaluate what it is to be wealthy (there's probably some back-to-the-stone-age type thinkers in the mix I do not doubt). There's a dark jealousy aspect that bothers me. That being said, the way the top 1% are accumulating wealth at an unimaginable rate is just nauseating. And the numbers back up the notion that everyone else's income levels are not growing at the same rate.
There have been some interesting suggestions around wealth distribution policies (higher VATs, guaranteed supplemented base income are two), I think those are serious policy options that need to be fleshed out and debated/implemented. But there's a lot of shouting going on right now that drowns out these incremental measures to get us back on the right track. Fix things now! seems to be the message out there, and that just ain't gonna happen.
But what holds me back the most; I have this very strong innate doubt that the Western capitalist model is sustainable. There are just not enough resources to go around. To abuse the Titanic metaphor, we're not just rearranging the deck chairs, there are also just not enough life boats to go around.
Economy, civil rights, environment. Each has multiple seemingly insurmountable issues. When faced with problems that are complex we are told to break them down into manageable components and deal with them one at a time. But doesn't it feel that these issues are too intertwined, the effects are compounding quickly and we just don't have the time to deal with them all?
Maybe our only option is a collective expression of disgust of where we are and where we are going. So no, I'm not saying stop protesting. Use your voices, try to make a difference, because in the end something does have to change.
I just wish I could put my finger exactly on what that change needs to be.
Wednesday, 5 October, 2011
I Am Pissed At Tim Hudak
I am seriously angered by Tim Hudak's campaign in the 2011 Ontario Provincial Election. Why? Because he has turned the Ontario PC party into the political equivalent of the Boston Red Sox.
Dalton McGuinty and the Ontario Liberal party do not deserve another majority mandate. Period. But (for me anyway) the Ontario Liberals are the least worst option. This has nothing to with how well Dalton McGuinty and the Ontario Liberals campaigned. It has everything to do with how poorly the others did. Specifically the Progressive Conservative party under Tim Hudak.
During the 2007 election, I didn't much care if the Liberals or the Progressive Conservatives won. Ontario under McGuinty or Tory would have charted pretty much the same path (one would hope John Tory would have handled the G8/G20 fiasco better, but that's unknowable). There wasn't a heck of a lot to differentiate the two parties other than the idiotic opening of the public funding of private religious schools issue.
Fast forward to 2011. Dalton McGuinty is justifiably very unpopular with Ontario citizens. The election campaign starts up and I totally expected a Progressive Conservative cakewalk. All Tim Hudak had to do was shut his mouth, smile and wave, and he would have won the election in a FPTP landslide. Not that I was looking forward to that result, I was just treating it as inevitable. For Pete's sake the man had a 20 point lead in the opinion polls just because his last name was Hudak and not McGuinty.
And then Tim Hudak opened his mouth and an ugly little troll fell out. First he called immigrants foreigners. Well he lost my family with that description. My father immigrated to Canada with his brothers, sisters and parents. They (like many immigrants) worked hard to be accepted as Canadians, often facing prejudice along the way. Way to bring back those unpleasant memories Tim! And then he doubled down with the homophobic anti-public education clusterfuck.
Believe it or not, I think Tim Hudak has committed a bigger sin. He failed to offer an alternative to the McGuinty Liberals. His entire campaign (when it isn't xenophobic or homophobic) has been based on promises to undo damned near every change McGuinty and the Liberals tried to introduce in their last two governments. It is one thing to win a campaign just by showing up and not being the other guy. That's politics, (and a failure of the electorate). It is another thing to actively promise to be the Anti-McGuinty. There's a difference between skipping Sunday service, and preaching Satanism as an alternative. (Or, there's a difference between discussing how a building should be constructed, and advocating it be blown up.)
I truly believe that we need strong alternative political views for our democracy to survive. And I am not seeing any of that this election, especially from the PC and NDP parties. Due to the nature of Ontario politics, the PC party had the best chance of replacing the Liberals, which is why I am holding them to a higher standard then the NDP (I am disappointed in the NDP, but they didn't piss me off the way the PC party did). Tim Hudak as their leader had a moral responsibility to all Ontarians to run an intelligent, forthright campaign that offered serious policy alternatives or improvements to the policies that the Liberals proposed. Tim Hudak utterly failed on all counts. Which makes the xenophobic/homophobic aspects all the more jarring. A decent platform wouldn't excuse those aspects of his campaign, but the complete absence of a platform raises that ugliness to a much higher profile. Tim Hudak is running as a total imbecile who is also a racist and a homophobe. Those three failures can be mutually exclusive, possessing all three is a spectacular orgy of ugly human traits in single human flesh-bag.
The fact that anyone is supporting the PC party depresses me even more as there is not one single redeeming quality in that party under the leadership of Tim Hudak, but that's a whole other topic. But the fact that Tim single handily destroyed any whiff of credibility the PC party possessed should cause him to be tarred and feathered and horse whipped out of town. His failure is complete and absolute, and he should pay dearly for that.
UPDATER: More from the Torontoist. "In this Provincial Election: Anyone But the Tories"
Dalton McGuinty and the Ontario Liberal party do not deserve another majority mandate. Period. But (for me anyway) the Ontario Liberals are the least worst option. This has nothing to with how well Dalton McGuinty and the Ontario Liberals campaigned. It has everything to do with how poorly the others did. Specifically the Progressive Conservative party under Tim Hudak.
During the 2007 election, I didn't much care if the Liberals or the Progressive Conservatives won. Ontario under McGuinty or Tory would have charted pretty much the same path (one would hope John Tory would have handled the G8/G20 fiasco better, but that's unknowable). There wasn't a heck of a lot to differentiate the two parties other than the idiotic opening of the public funding of private religious schools issue.
Fast forward to 2011. Dalton McGuinty is justifiably very unpopular with Ontario citizens. The election campaign starts up and I totally expected a Progressive Conservative cakewalk. All Tim Hudak had to do was shut his mouth, smile and wave, and he would have won the election in a FPTP landslide. Not that I was looking forward to that result, I was just treating it as inevitable. For Pete's sake the man had a 20 point lead in the opinion polls just because his last name was Hudak and not McGuinty.
And then Tim Hudak opened his mouth and an ugly little troll fell out. First he called immigrants foreigners. Well he lost my family with that description. My father immigrated to Canada with his brothers, sisters and parents. They (like many immigrants) worked hard to be accepted as Canadians, often facing prejudice along the way. Way to bring back those unpleasant memories Tim! And then he doubled down with the homophobic anti-public education clusterfuck.
Believe it or not, I think Tim Hudak has committed a bigger sin. He failed to offer an alternative to the McGuinty Liberals. His entire campaign (when it isn't xenophobic or homophobic) has been based on promises to undo damned near every change McGuinty and the Liberals tried to introduce in their last two governments. It is one thing to win a campaign just by showing up and not being the other guy. That's politics, (and a failure of the electorate). It is another thing to actively promise to be the Anti-McGuinty. There's a difference between skipping Sunday service, and preaching Satanism as an alternative. (Or, there's a difference between discussing how a building should be constructed, and advocating it be blown up.)
I truly believe that we need strong alternative political views for our democracy to survive. And I am not seeing any of that this election, especially from the PC and NDP parties. Due to the nature of Ontario politics, the PC party had the best chance of replacing the Liberals, which is why I am holding them to a higher standard then the NDP (I am disappointed in the NDP, but they didn't piss me off the way the PC party did). Tim Hudak as their leader had a moral responsibility to all Ontarians to run an intelligent, forthright campaign that offered serious policy alternatives or improvements to the policies that the Liberals proposed. Tim Hudak utterly failed on all counts. Which makes the xenophobic/homophobic aspects all the more jarring. A decent platform wouldn't excuse those aspects of his campaign, but the complete absence of a platform raises that ugliness to a much higher profile. Tim Hudak is running as a total imbecile who is also a racist and a homophobe. Those three failures can be mutually exclusive, possessing all three is a spectacular orgy of ugly human traits in single human flesh-bag.
The fact that anyone is supporting the PC party depresses me even more as there is not one single redeeming quality in that party under the leadership of Tim Hudak, but that's a whole other topic. But the fact that Tim single handily destroyed any whiff of credibility the PC party possessed should cause him to be tarred and feathered and horse whipped out of town. His failure is complete and absolute, and he should pay dearly for that.
UPDATER: More from the Torontoist. "In this Provincial Election: Anyone But the Tories"
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