America Alone

I have just completed Mark Steyn's tome, America Alone, the End of the World as We Know It. I recommend this book to EVERYONE, regardless of political persuasion.

Steyn lays our clearly that western civilization may be doomed by it's own social-welfare state policies and the consequences of same.

The difference in birthrate between western nations and Islamic states is startling and the fact of the matter is Europe may be majority muslim during this century. Do you think liberal democracy in Europe has a chance of surviving a majority who follow imams show preach hatred of infidels? Steyn doesn't think so and I must agree with him.

The other key aspect of Steyn's arguments is that Western Civilization has lost the will to fight for what it's values need to be in order to survive. Multiculturalism and tolerance will not protect free speech or freedom of religion. They cannot if a significant a growing part of the population despises everything that the West stands for. Allowing the Charter of Rights and Freedoms to protect an imam who preaches what can only be described as treasonous behaviour is ludicrous if we have any hope of survival in the next 100 years.

After reading Steyn, it also frustrates me that we are arguing over things like "climate change" when it may be irrelevant if the next century ushers in a new "dark ages", and industrial civilization collapses in the face of a seventh-century ideology. We need the ideology of freedom to stand up for itself and fight this battle.

The big question is, what ideals are you willing to fight for, to send your sons into combat for? If there is nothing, then you must be willing to let the enemy win.

The Conservatives are showing their big-government bias...

The Conservative government in Ottawa is showing it's bias towards big government, in two stories in the National Post this morning.

First, there is the story about how the Labour Minister, Jean-Pierre Blackburn, is proposing that the federal government enforce pay equity in federally regulated businesses. This is essentially the government deciding who should get paid what and what the value of a job is, rather than the market deciding. Do you want a bureaucrat in Ottawa deciding how much you should get paid, or if you own a business, deciding how much you should pay your employees? This is further complicated because the current pay-equity rules speak of "equal pay for work of equal value". The problem is who gets to decide the value of the work? If the bureaucrat decides that the tellers in a bank provide the same "value" as the investment bankers, we have a serious problem...

The second story is about how the Canada Labour Code is recommending a national minimum wage, and that the NDP is pushing at $10/hr. This would be $2.00 higher than the highest provincially mandated minimum wage, found in B.C. While this would only apply to federally regulated businesses. The CLC also indicated that the government should enforce more strictly laws about overtime and vacation. The market handles this very effectively. If you don't like the terms of a job, you can quit and find another one. Of course, if the welfare state has caused structural unemployment to site around 10%, this is more difficult, but then you can always choose the dole.

These proposals from Ottawa are detrimental to the interests of the people and of the country. They should die a quick death.

Utopian Dreams lead to Chaos

Celestial Junk has an excellent commentary on where the Utopian Left would lead us in the relationship between Western Civilization and Islamic Fundamentalism.

One point against the Conservative Government

In June 2006, the Minister of Agriculture, Chuck Strahl, indicated that the government supported the marketing boards, stating:

"We think the system has worked well for Canada. It's a system other countries should consider as part of their agricultural policy," Strahl said.

I wrote to the minister pointing out that supply management for the purposes of increasing the economic security of the producers reduces the economic security of everyone else in the economy (F.A. Hayek, The Road to Serfdom, 1944). Supply management does nothing but protect consumers from low prices.

I received a response from Chris Patterson (Senior Policy Advisor) and Marilyn McEwan (Agriculture Canada) indicating the following:

"have long supported the concept that producers are the most appropriate judges of the type of marketing systems that best serve their needs. In the case of supply management, it is a shared federal-provincial jurisdiction. Many producers who currently operate under the supply management system have not requested either the federal or provincial governments to remove the system."

Well of course the producers aren't going to ask to reduce their economic security. I replied:

The fundamental problem is that the producers will select a system that benefits them the most, even at the expense of others. In this case, the governments' support and legislation regarding supply management improves the economic security of the producers at the expense of the consumers who buy their products. Since there are more consumers than producers, this policy reduces the economic security of more people than it helps.

Therefore, the concept that the government supports is damaging to Canadians and to our economic health.

I received this response this week:

The purpose of the dairy supply management system is to provide producers of milk with the opportunity to obtain fair returns for their labour and investments, and to provide consumers of dairy products with a continuous and adequate supply of dairy products. This is not to say that our supply management system is perfect; indeed, there are some important disadvantages to the system such as the difficulty new producers have in entering the system and the displacement of the use of dairy products by the processing industry with products like milk protein concentrates. Nonetheless, the Government supports those industries and producers who have chosen to market their products in this way.

In order to address the issues that are creating problems within the industry, the Minister has tasked both dairy producers and processors to work on developing solutions, which will benefit all, including the consumer.

OK, so they've admitted that the existing system protects existing producers while making it nigh impossible for new competitors to enter the market. Good first step. The bigger mistake is that the government (and their policy advisors) are not leading the country. They are letting the minority (the existing producers) do what is best for them, at the expense of everyone else.

I call on the Minister to reverse position and dissolve all the marketing boards. Because marketing boards don't help Canada. They hurt it.

Public opinion is wrong on Afghanistan

So the Canadian public wants us out of Afghanistan

globeandmail.com : Most Canadians believe Afghan mission a lost cause: survey

So, the Canadian public thinks we should stop fighting the Taliban and let them return Afghanistan to a strict sharia-based society where women and girls are second-class humans who don't deserve an education, where individual freedoms are meaningless and personal investigations into anything from science to philosophy to religion or politics is verboten...

The problem is that the fight in Afghanistan is a significant front in the War.  This War is not George Bush's War on Terror.  This is the War between Civilization and Barbarism.  There is no negotiable, touchy-feely way to solve this situation.  If you believe in freedom of speech, thought, religion and all that goes with it, you cannot disagree with this war.  If you are ok with intolerance and totalitarianism, then you can be against it.

Which side are you on?

On the Laval Bridge Collapse

The history of engineering projects teaches us that improvements are made slowly over time, but that intermittent catastrophic failures result in rapid improvements.

The situation in Laval is not an example of engineering failure. The bridge stood for 36 years. The problem was in inspection and maintenance. The government of Quebec has called a public inquiry to determine the cause... I don't think they are going to like the result, if they allow it to come to an honest result.

The problem is that governments in Canada (and elsewhere) love spending capital to build infrastructure. It gets them votes. They then fail to properly pay for maintenance, thus the condition of much of the country's roads and bridges. They do this because they get better political results from spending money on social programs and new infrastructure.

In the coming days and weeks you will hear local politicians blame the provinces for failing to fund properly, and provincial politicians blaming Ottawa for failing to fund properly.

The truth is, it is the municipalities and provinces who have failed to choose to spend enough on maintenance (or on not using salt to destroy infrastructure). They chose to spend it on other things. And as voters we let them do it. I wouldn't be surprised if across the country a significant number of bridges are closed in the coming weeks/months due to increased inspections.