Why I Sometimes Don't Like Facebook

It was a slow start to my day this morning (I didn't get up until 7:30!). No particular reason - I just didn't feel like rushing and it seemed like ones of those days when one should not have to rush.  Even the news items on either the CBC or the Globe and Mail sites seemed somewhat un-stimulating or uninteresting. It was almost as if we were already in the dog days of summer.  Perhaps three days in a row of sun will do that to a body who is just waking up from the extended hibernation that is winter in Ontario. At any rate I had time, as I ate my breakfast of rice and a handful of peanuts, to scroll through my Facebook page. That was when I saw an item posted by a friend of a friend stating that Salt Spring and Galiano Islands had been selected for the building of a fixed bridge link between the Islands and Duncan on Vancouver Island. The news release included a detailed map etc. It made some sense. If P.E.I. can have a fixed link, why not Salt Spring?

I initially thought - great no more waiting for ferries or paying the $11.00 walk on fee. I started to think about how easy it would be to go back and forth between my son's house in Duncan and my friend's house on Salt Spring Island.  Anyone who has spent any time on the west coast knows the hassle and the cost of the BC ferry system. Trying to cross from the mainland to one of the islands especially during the busy times can mean hours of waiting and the expenditure (if you are in a car) of the week's grocery money. A fixed link would solve all of those problems. I then fairly quickly realized that if it would be convenient for me, then it would be convenient for a whole bunch of other people. And that would not be a good thing.

The roads on Salt Spring are already crazy busy on weekends. Parking in Ganges is almost impossible and there are times when even crossing the road can be problematic. If the government made it easier to get on the island, it would just be too crowded. The more I thought about it, the more frustrated and irritated I became. It sounded like one of those typical government plans that someone in an office tower thought of. Perhaps someone who had never been on one of the islands. Clearly that person needed to re-think the problem or perhaps even figure out if there is really a problem that needs to be solved. Adding more cars could not be a solution to anything.  I started to suspect that the initiative for the plan came from people who lived on the islands but wanted to commute elsewhere to work. Clearly people with political connections.

I went through my morning routines, spent a hour or two playing with wool and then went for a walk downtown to the library. In the back of my mind was this nagging thought that I should do something. I was not too sure what as I am not a resident of Salt Spring or for the matter of B.C., but I felt this urge to be active on this topic.

After lunch I check my Facebook page again to see if there was any more information.... another friend had posted the comment that it had been an April Fools joke! People who lived on the Island had first seen the post on April 1 and all of them knew it was just someone with time on their hands being a bit silly.

It was only us off-slanders who got taken in. Good joke - creative, funny and just almost possible enough to suck us in. The problem is that either one ignores all of these bits and pieces of "news" (and thereby risking ignoring something that is really important) or one spends hours and hours on the internet checking out how reliable the information is. We may have more access to "news" than ever before but I am just not sure if we have the capacity to determine what is real and what is not.

Cap and Trade for Ontario - the Good News and the Bad News

The good news is that Ontario along with Quebec, British Columbia, Manitoba, Prince Edward Island and Alberta now have some form of a carbon emission policy. While it would be even better if there was over-arching federal participation in reducing the emissions of carbon, it is a good first step. It perhaps is even great news that Ontario is joining with Quebec to create a Cap and Trade system for the two most industrialized provinces. It demonstrates how member provinces within a confederation are suppose to work together. While there will be thousands of provincial conservatives howling at their Tory gods that this is just another tax grab - the fact is that one is more likely to see maple syrup flowing downhill in January in either of those two provinces than to see industries reducing their emissions on their own.

The bad news is that it may not work unless the various provincial governments are really serious about reducing carbon emission and are prepared to suffer the "slings and arrows" of an outraged and whinny electorate. The price of some products will increase. But the environment is not going to get clean by itself. Things will not change any time in the perceivable future if we wait for industries to do it on their own.

The Cap and Trade system is a two step process. The "Cap" part of the name refers to a process by which a government sets a limit or a Cap on the amount of carbon emission an industry can spew into the air. If, for example GM exceeds that limit they will be either fined or they can buy a "certain number of pollution permits that they can trade among themselves" (Washington Post). That is, if Ford is less polluting than GM, Ford can sell (trade for money) its unused pollution permits to competitors who are polluting. Theoretically as the government initial sets both the limits in terms of carbon emissions and the price and number of permits, the "natural" market forces will force companies to be more efficient and less polluting. Capitalists would argue that the market will always force companies to be more efficient. Some of us are less sure that that is true.

Europe has established a Cap and Trade program and it appears to be a dismal failure. It is not working at least in part because (1) the limits as to how much carbon an industry could emit was far too high and (2) the price of the permits was far too low. There is no incentive for companies to reduce emissions when the cost of exceeding their limit is cheaper than the cost of utilization of new technologies to reduce emissions. Ontario and Quebec (who are joining the trading marking established by California) will need to ensure that the limits they establish will encourage (force) companies to reduce their carbon emissions. The cost to purchase permits to exceed their limits must be high enough to discourage them from doing so. Those companies will scream loudly. They will also fund other political parties to scream even louder. It will take political courage to make this work.

While it may be great that Ontario and Quebec are working together, without a national Cap and Trade program, a province with a different set of limits (perhaps higher limits for carbon emissions) might attract industries from a province than was more committed to reducing carbon emissions. There needs to be a national standard of what is the allowable amount of carbon emissions for all industries.

In other jurisdictions where Cap and Trade programs have been established, companies have been allowed to purchase large tracts of forested land and to "earn" credits/permits that they can either sell or that they can use to off-set their emissions elsewhere. This is absurd.  Lands acting as carbon sinks belong to us all. Companies should not get bonus points for buying them. The whole point of Cap and Trade programs is to reduce the amount of carbon emissions into the atmosphere. The trading of a forest's capacity to absorb carbon in exchange for increase pollution from and industry at best maintains the status quo. That is not good enough.

So three cheers for the premiers who are trying to do the right thing. We need to get onside with them and make sure that the limits they set are going to be effective. Mother Earth needs our help.

In praise of Civil Servants for Protecting Those who are Approaching Senility

I don't bother to get my mail very often. Other than my Walrus magazine which come ten times a year and the odd check from my insurance company reimbursing me for their share of my dental bills, 95% of my mail is junk mail and seldom worthy of my attention. However yesterday (Sunday) I did check my mail. Much to my surprise amongst the silly waste of paper offering me cheap hamburgers and pizza, there was a "Notice of my impending conviction" from the City of Peterborough. Apparently I had ignored a parking ticket from a month ago and either I had to pay $31.00 immediately or be prepared to go to trial. 

My first reaction was that I had probably forgotten to pay a parking ticket "earned" while parking at the library. I have in the past ranted about having to pay for parking in the downtown area but I do pay my, what seems to be my once a year parking ticket, when I get them. I don't like it, but I am a reasonably law abiding citizens when I get caught.  But when I looked at the notice it was for a street I had never heard of. I was almost completely sure that I had never been on that street. In fact I had to Goggle it to see where it was. Clearly someone had made a mistake. But then I started to think about it. I started to question if it would have been possible that I had been there and just forgotten it.

My mind, which is generally sound, does occasionally miss a few things. My argument is that it is so full of information that sometimes I just don't remember where I have filed something. Because I live alone and on most days, with the exception of looking at my pill box when I take my morning medication, it is seldom important what day of the week it is, I can lose track of day and time. I am not senile - those things are just less important to me than they use to be. And so it festered there - that niggling little thought that grew bigger and bigger. Was it possible that I had been there and just not remembered? Three weeks ago is not a long time but who knows what I was doing then? I could argue that I was in my apartment playing with wool - which is a safe bet as that is what I do much of the time - but the very fact that that is what I do much of the time means that I didn't remember doing it or not doing it that particular day.

Other than driving to that street to see if seeing it would refresh my memory, there was nothing I could do.  I resisted the temptation to do that. I went to bed thinking about what I would say to the people at city hall this morning. I woke up thinking about the same thing.

I called city hall this morning. A charming helpful person looked up the time of the infraction - it was for 3:20 in the morning. I said it was not me, she doubled checked and then confirmed with me the kind of car I drove, told me there had been a mistake as the car in question was clearly not mine and promised to fix the error. She apologize for the error (sort of), we wished each other a good day and that was that. Problem solved.

I am not senile. I had not forgotten parking my car on an unfamiliar street. My mild anxiety had been created because I thought maybe I was losing it faster than I had previously thought.  I think I thought that that was a possibility because of all the discussion etc about the thousands and thousands of Canadian seniors who are struggling with memory loss, dementia and Alzheimer's. The anxiety caused by being concerned about the possibility may be worse than actually on occasion forgetting something important. I suspect for many of us - that anxiety will be an ongoing issue.

But this time - thanks to someone who knew how to do her job with grace and efficiency - I know, at least for today, I am okay. And that is a good thing.