Air travel - the Almost Constant Gamble

I came to flying on airplanes fairly late in life. I was in my mid-fifties before I ever flew. During the past ten or fifteen years I have only ever flown between Ontario and British Columbia. Clearly I am not an experienced air traveller. It is not that I am, or ever have been afraid of flying - in fact I quite enjoy the sensations - I just never had a reason (or the financial resources) to fly when I was younger. I am not however, a fan of the whole experience - getting to the airport  90 minutes before your flight leaves, having to partially disrobe for the security check and the following awkwardness of putting on my belt and shoes afterwards, the endless walks- sometimes done in panic as the connecting times between my flights has been shortened by mechanical difficulties, de-icing and other assorted delays; a walk exacerbated by the fact that the runways for short flights are at the opposite end of the airport from those of longer flights. But now I have a new thing to be worries about. Getting kicked off of the plane.

It may be because people losing their seats on airplanes has become a story to watch for that the media are reporting it more often; it may be that I am just more aware of it, but it feels as if, almost on a daily basis, someone, somewhere has been asked to leave their seat because the airlines have overbooked. Airline travel is already surprisingly inconvenient. It is quite clear that the airlines, at least for those of us who travel economy, see us as cash cows who willing can be squished into ever smaller seats and who require minimal services. When things do not work out according to schedule - there is barely an apology. For example last November when I was making my near semi-annual trip to Ontario, in Toronto, at sometime around 10:30PM I was informed that the fight had been cancelled due to weather conditions. I was not to fly out until 8:00 AM the next morning. I was offered $20.00 in food vouchers to compensate me. While I could appreciate the fact that the weather is beyond the control of Air Canada and that I did not want to fly if it was too dangerous to land, at the very least giving me a suggestion as to what I could do for the next ten hours would have been nice.

I find it absurd that I, who bought a ticket months ago, have no guarantee that I will get on my chosen plane. That some airline employee who is dead heading - to get to another airport to work on another plane - can get my seat. The seat that I paid extra for so that it does not feel as if my knees are being  forced to rest somewhere near my chin might go to someone else. Yes I will be offered some financial compensation. But how much would be enough for me to waste hours/days in waiting for a next flight. If I wanted to spend 24 hours flying the 5,000 kilometres - I could have chosen a series of flights that did that. I chose a more direct route. It would be nice if the airline companies respected my choice.

I understand that airlines over book on some flights because there are some cancellations or no-shows on some flights. For the airlines, they can only maximize their profits if the plane is full. I get that. If I were a share holder of Air Canada - I too would want my returns maximized. But I don't understand why I should be punished or treated badly because other people cancel their flights. It is not my problem.

To make matters a wee bit worse - my daughter has just sent me a message from the Greater Sudbury Airport that flights maybe delayed or cancelled due to runway maintenance at Toronto Airport. Lovely...they have know about the repairs for months....perhaps Air Canada could have told us.

Good News and Bad News - The Conservative Party's Nominations

Last week Kevin O'Leary bowed out of the leadership campaign for the Conservative Party. That is the good news. O'Leary was, at best a misguided, overly arrogant and completely inexperienced candidate. At worst, his proposed policies suggested dangerous directions for Canada to go in. He was bombastic, he seemed to say whatever popped into his head without  any filtering and he was combative to those he disagreed with. It is not completely clear to me as to why he quit the race. His stated reason - that being that while he knew he could be elected as leader of the party, he did not think that he could gain enough seats in Quebec to win a general election, does not ring true. A number of prime ministers have been elected without winning a lot of seat in Quebec  - most recently Harper. I suspect that he left the race because he realized, just days before his fellow businessman turned leader realized it, that running a country is a lot of work and, I suspect, not nearly as much fun as he thought.

The bad news is that the front runner in the above race is now Maxime Bernier - the person who O'Leary now supports. No one is ever sure if, when a candidate gives his support to another candidate, if his supporters follow him. That is - will those who said that O'Leary was their first choice, now switch to Bernier. One can only hope not.

Bernier is, in terms of political values and philosophies, a libertarian. He believes that if only the government would stop trying to regulate Canadians and their business practices, life would be fine. Libertarians generally believe in the trickle-down theory of economics. That if there is lots of money being generated by unfettered business - that everyone will be better off. The only people I know who believe this theory are those who are rich or who have a reasonable expectations that they will be. The rest of us know that it is just not true. I appreciate that frequently various governments appear to be far too involved in our daily lives. But there is no indication, in fact the data proves the opposite, that businesses left to themselves will do the right thing and protect the environment, the disadvantaged, minorities and the consumer.

It would appear the Bernier may become the next leader of the Conservative Party. If this happens, then our job will be to ensure that he does not become the next Prime Minister.

Being Petty - Some Inequities in Canada/USA Trade

It quite frankly takes all of my self-will to not allow myself to become reactive and even petty at Trump's outlandish statements as to what is fair and not fair in terms of Canada/US trade. I need to keep reminding myself that not only is he a buffoon who has neither the moral integrity of a snail (I apologize to all snails for this comparison) or the intellectual capacity of a child in grade one (I again apologize), he seems incapable of staying on task for any length of time. It is clear that he can be influenced and have his mind changed by almost anyone who can find a way to talk to him. I also need to remind myself that his bias as to the importance and absolute need for the USA to be first in everything is not unique to this president. Indeed - it is a common trait of many USA's citizens.

Whether or not there is an inequity or an unfairness with how Canada markets its softwood lumber has been debated at a number of international tribunals and courts over the past few decades. In every instance, the USA has been told that there is no unfairness and therefore they should not impose a tariff. I am sure that the same thing will happen this time - it is a shame that both countries are going to waste so much time and tax payer's money to debate it, all because a handful of US softwood companies want an uneven playing field upon which to compete. It seems more than slightly absurd to imagine the USA with ten times the population being concerned with such a minor problem.

Then there is the most recent kerfuffle from Trump over the concern from some Wisconsin dairy farmer's cries of unfairness over the fact that they are being denied access to Canadian milk markets. My opinion of our marketing boards was discussed in a blog posted on March 20, 2015 - In the past two years I have seen no reason to change my mind. It seems to me that a nation has the right to decide how to support its citizens. However the absurdity of a state like Wisconsin - which has more dairy cows (USA) then all of Canada ( facts) - complaining about not being allowed to saturate an international market defies description.

Being petty - perhaps it is time that we started to cry unfair when we look at the amount of fresh fruits and vegetables that being imported from California to Canada. CBC (CBC) reported that in 2013, Canada imported 2.7 billion dollars worth of California's fresh fruits, vegetable and nuts. Those  fruits and vegetable were only able to grow because of irrigation. According to author Marc Reisner, the building of dams on such rivers as the Colorado and its tributaries have allowed farmers to grow crops on land that would never have produced.   Furthermore, California farmers are not paying the full cost of the water that is being drawn from the rivers and aquifers of western USA. He argues that they are paying less than ten percent of the cost of the construction of the dams and irrigation systems built. The government has subsidized irrigating large factory farms for generations. Surely this could be called unfair trading practice. What chance does a Canadian farmer have of competing with his USA counterpart when there is such an uneven playing field?

Marc Reisner's book -  Cadillac desert: the American West and its disappearing water is not an easy read. Like other history books written by people with lots of facts and a self righteous passion for a topic, but no sense of storytelling, it is a book full of facts but demonstrates little understanding of the people behind the facts. However, it is very clear that the USA, in its mission to fulfill it manifest destiny, has taken (Reisner would perhaps use the word "drained") water from states further to the east and directed it to deserts or near deserts of California and elsewhere to grow crops and to build cities (e.g. Los Angeles).  His projection for the future is bleak. California would never exist if the water was not being imported from elsewhere. The large farms only exist because of that water and because that water has been very cheap for the those land owners. The current rate of use is not sustainable. There quite simply is not enough water to maintain the farms and the cities for ever. When the water dries up - and it will - those farms and those cities will eventually shrink to what they should have been if humankind had not decided to attempt to control geography and destiny.

Perhaps we would be doing a favour for the USA if we said we would no longer buy fruits, vegetables and nuts from California as they were using unfair trade practices. Perhaps some citizens would wake up and realize that they are living on both borrowed water and borrowed time. Perhaps some would realize that irrigating deserts is just a foolish idea - but then so is play God.

A Wee Rant on Wasting Paper

Yesterday morning, as I was packing up my car to go to the Duncan Saturday Market, I noticed that the newest edition of the Duncan telephone book had been thrown onto my deck. At some point after supper the previous night, someone had dropped it off.  I had seen her do it but was not really paying attention. If I had been - I would have gone outside and asked her to keep it.

I can appreciate that the process of printing this once needed service (approx. 17 cm x 22cmx 2.5 cm thick) must make money for someone. I assume that the companies that are listed in the Yellow Pages - which comprise approximately one third of the pages- pay for that privilege. Those companies must think that having a listing in the Yellow p ages is a productive way of advertising. The people who sell those ads, the folks who set up the pages on the computer, the people who run the printing and binding machines all must make a little bit of money. For some, it may be their primary source of income. Even the young lady who delivered the phone book must have made something although given the over-sized pickup she was driving, one has to wonder what her profit margin was. But is the book really needed?

Given the generally easy access to almost all information including the Yellow Pages on the internet and the overwhelming number of people who now have some sort of "smart'  phone almost permanently attached to one of their hands, one has to wonder why anyone would think it a good idea to universally distribute such a book. There was a time when a telephone book was a valued tool.  The phone book allowed people to find each other or to find services when there was no other way. The phone book, it could be argued, was as important for civilization as was the phone booth. Much to my disappointment, given the fact that I have been slow to embrace the concept that everyone needs to have a cell phone, telephone booths are very difficult to find in almost any city. Why? Because the telephone companies realize that no one really needs them. Perhaps it is time that people stopped expending valuable resources to print a book that is not similarly not needed.

If I thought that the book was distributed only to such communities as the one I live in - where everyone is older than 55 and I suspect the average might be closer to 75 or even eighty - perhaps the book would have some value. There could be an argument made that "old" people don't use the computer. While it is true that my neighbour next door is not computer literate, I suspect he is in the minority. Certainly all of his neighbours use the computer. However if this telephone book was produced only for people above a certain age - surely they could have made the print font just a wee bit bigger!

I lack the ability to calculate how many trees have been used to print all of the phone books across Canada. I think it would be a lot.

If I knew who to protest to - I would. But I don't , so I will take the old phone book that I got last year and have yet to open, chuck it into the recycling container. I suspect a year from now I will be doing the same thing with this year's phone book. Throwing it away - unopened.

Surely there is a better way.

The Re-awaking of the International Bully to the South of Us.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines a bully as "A person who uses strength or influence to harm or intimate those who are weaker". I suspects that Mr. Trump has always been a bully.  It appears as if his approach to almost any discussion either face to face or when on social media is to bombastically shout over his opponent, insulting them whenever possible and ignoring them when they say things he doesn't like. He has used his financial power to dominate. His approach has been surprising successful in his business life. Experience has shown him that many people just back down when faced with this overbearing attitude, perhaps in part because  they can't believe it is happening.   Mr. Trump has recently started to apply that apparently successful strategy to international affairs.

There have been times when the USA was capable of, and the population was willing to, support a president who wanted to dominate world politics. For example, the American political philosophy of manifest destiny has long been applied to other parts of the world. The Mexican -American War of the late 1840s was a blatant land grab as was Spanish American War fifty or so years later.  In fact for the next hundred years, the USA consistently, whether overtly or subvertly, stuck its nose into the politics of various countries scattered across the globe. And for the most part they got away with it. The USA, in terms of their economy were the world power. They could afford to either directly or indirectly buy governments , to use their economic might to pressure  governments to do what they wanted or if that failed - they had a large enough army and navy to threatened countries. There was as well a time when the battle lines between the Soviet Union and the USA were clear; a time when 90% of the world was divided into two political camps. Countries that fell within the USA's sphere of influence - automatically supported their ally. I am not too sure if Trump realizes that things are changed.

The USA is not the economic powerhouse it once was. There are other countries (e.g. China and India) whose economies have a significant impact on the world economy. There are other countries who may in fact have healthier economies and who are not dependent upon the USA. As the US's economic power wanes - citizens in other countries are less willing to be influenced by USA's political desires. The reduced economic power also means that the US has less money to continually build up its armed forces. It is clear from the recent budget submitted by Trump that if the priorities are to better support the armed forces - then there are not sufficient funds to support the environment or enhanced social programs. And finally - while citizens of the US have, because of extraordinary manipulation (e.g. the myth of weapons of mass destruction), been supportive of American intervention in the Middle East, their natural desire to be insulated from the world predominates (part of Trump's winning campaign platform was the promise to not engage in foreign wars). There may not be a way to convince the American public that another war is a good thing for them.

In the past ten or so days - Trump has dropped the largest non-nuclear bomb ever made, has continued to threaten North Korea with the USA's Navy sailing ever closer to their water, used 59 cruise missiles to protest Assad's use of chemical weapons and has been surprisingly combative with Russia. It would appear as if Trump thinks that these dictators will react to his bluster. It appears as if he thinks that these men perhaps don't understand the art of bullying. By definition Putin, Assad and  Kim Jong-un are bullies. They have been bullies on the international stage for far longer than has been Trump. They have total control of their countries political apparatus and they have far more to lose if they back down.  They are not going to back down quickly or easily.

If Trump does not find a way out (although he seems to never be embarrassed about changing his mind and then doing the exact opposite of what he promised), the world is going to come far too close to another war. There are times when I start to understand how some people felt in 1914 or 1939 as they watched their world slip in chaos.