Shatnerian

In Which My Political Career Is Discussed

John — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:25:29 +0000

For most of my life, my relationship with politics has been as an observer. It wasn’t really until high school that I started paying attention to it and that was thanks to my best friend, an ardent Canadian nationalist obsessed with current events. The day after the 1987 New Brunswick provincial election, in which Frank McKenna led his Liberal Party to a 58 seat sweep of the legislature, he met me in the school’s hallway and asked if I had watched the election returns on CBC last night.

Not wanting to let him down, I said I had and then nodded cheerfully in agreement as he recounted the excited coverage of what was, in fact, an historic accomplishment. One which I hadn’t seen because I was probably watching Moonlighting (which, according to Wikipedia, was on TV that night). But it was my friend who showed me how interesting Canadian politics can be and as a result, he was something of a good influence on me.

After that, I got better at paying attention to politics. A friend at university sent me to a Liberal rally in 1993 where Liberal leader Jean Chrétien reacted to a negative ad put out by the PCs (his reaction is about 30 seconds into the video). 1993 was also the first year I could vote federally. Because of this II was brought into a panel discussion of young, first time voters on the local CBC morning show. On the show, I took my then incumbent MP to task for failing to show up at one of the debates and eventually admitted that I would be voting NDP. For a guy who, at the time, was trying break into radio broadcasting, declaring my party allegiance on the public airwaves probably wasn’t the best career move. As you may have noticed, I don’t currently work in broadcasting.

I spent the 90’s political aware in as much as I went first to the politics section of the newspaper but never spent much time in party politics. Once while freelancing for a local alternative weekly, I attended a talk given by Stockwell Day who was running for the leadership of what was called at the time the Canadian Alliance. At the time, I thought he was a bit of an intellectual lightweight and didn’t think his social conservatism would play well in Atlantic Canada, which tends to go for the more measured Robert Stanfield style of conservative politics.

In 2002, I joined the NDP long enough to vote for Jack Layton as I was tired of seeing the party come in with its usual 30 or 40 seats and thought Layton would be the guy to change that. In the long run, it turned out to be correct but it took ten years and Layton would not live to lead the Official Opposition.

After he died, I decided to join the party. While I don’t agree with every one of their policies, overall, they’re the best fit for me politically. I harbour no illusions about party politics and the realities of governing. Should the NDP ever form government, its most ardent supporters will need to realize that compromises will need to be made if they wish to continue governing. The key part of it is that I would be more comfortable with an NDP compromise than a Liberal one. My initial goal is to work with the local riding association to get an NDP MP elected in my riding in the next election.

So I emailed them and asked if I could volunteer. Their representative emailed back and mentioned the leadership debate that was held last night at Concordia. I asked if there was anything they needed me to do but they never got back to me. I’m not really sure what happened there. They maybe just had the people they needed. If you follow my Twitter feed, it’s evident that I ended up going to Concordia to watch the thing myself.

I don’t think anyone would ever accuse the NDP leadership candidates of not being on the same page. It was the most cordial debate I’d ever witnessed. There was some disagreement between the candidates from rural Canada, Niki Ashton and Nathan Cullen, and those candidates from urban Canada: Peggy Nash, Brian Topp. The other front runner, Thomas Mulcair, was not in attendance due to a previous commitment.

But overall, it seems that the race is not about defining the party ideologically. That’s already done. It’s about selling that to enough Canadians to form a government and that involves finding the right person to make that pitch. I think that person will most likely end up being Brian Topp and I may well vote for him as leader. He satisfies a lot of qualities required for a national leader: fluently bilingual, from Quebec, lives in Toronto, but worked with NDP governments in Saskatchewan.

I was impressed with the youngest candidate: Niki Ashton. I’ve read a few condescending remarks concerning her age but I think people underestimate her at their peril. While, clearly, she’s not going to be leader, I can see her doing big things in the party further down the road.

Also, Ashton has the best campaign poster by a mile. I just can’t see Nathan Cullen pulling off that sleeveless black dress look.

So there it is. I went and joined a party. I even bought an NDP coffee mug so, clearly, this is serious.

Filed under: Canada, Politics

In Which Press Coffee Is Considered

John — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 15:40:45 +0000

For Christmas, I received a Bodum coffee maker. I was thrilled because I decided to use it at my office for coffee, which will cut back on buying coffee from the coin-operated Keurig and save me some money in the long run. In addition, I figured I’d get a better cup of coffee out of the deal.

I got my beans at the supermarket and, not having a bean grinder at home, ground them in the store’s machine, on the coarse setting. To fill the pot I used the Keurig’s hot water spout.

And the coffee was … sludgy and lukewarm. Well, the temperature could be explained by the fact that the water just wasn’t that hot so I decided to get a kettle and make the coffee with proper boiling water.

Then I did some research on the internet to find a few tips about using a Bodum, because it’s been a while for me, and learned the following:

The beans I bought were wrong because they weren’t roasted 10 days ago.
The beans should be kept in an airtight container and not, as I have, a brown paper bag in my desk drawer.
The beans should be ground each time before making a pot.
The beans should not be ground with a cheap blade grinder. It must be a conical slow grinder that costs $300, at least.
If the beans are not evenly ground, the coffee will be terrible.
Unrelated to press coffee but important to note just the same: I’m stupid if I use an automatic drip coffee maker, even if I bought it at Loblaw’s and put an Apple sticker on it and called it my iBrew.

Well, now. That was exhausting. Anyhow, today I boiled the water before making my coffee. That pretty much solved all my issues.

Filed under: Whatever

The Spirit of Not Giving So Much

John — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 20:29:28 +0000

In a little more than a week, we’ll be celebrating my son’s 3rd Christmas. He’s written a letter (sent via Canada Post) to Santa, asking for a truck and a signal for his railway tracks. He’s still at that young age where any gift is impressive and he’s happy enough with his toys. It’s relatively easy for Santa to answer his requests.

But for an economy that’s supposedly so sluggish, has anyone tried to get to Fairview on a Saturday lately? Either everyone got a holiday bonus but me or Mark Carney is correct about household debt levels. Although I do find it terribly amusing when the federal government says our debt is too high.

It’s this point before Christmas when I begin to feel that grip of anxiety: Is there enough food in the house? Did I give enough to charity? Is our tree too dry (just checked this morning. It’s seriously dry all of a sudden)? Should I have visited my family in New Brunswick instead of staying in Montreal? Is there enough booze in the house? The short answer to the last one is no. We have Sheridans which never gets drunk and Ouzo which also never gets drunk.

And I also worry that we haven’t bought enough stuff for each other. Not for James, mind you. Santa’s giving him a Leapster. He’s doing just fine. We did decide earlier this year that we’re just going to get some furniture from Ikea that we need instead going lavish with the gifts. When I return to work and hear my colleagues tell of the extravagant gifts they got for their loved ones, I always feel a little inadequate. I also felt that way when I mentioned our Ikea plans to someone at work. "Oh yeah," she said. "We ran out of money when we bought our house so we did the second floor entirely in Ikea."

Damn it, I like Ikea. And if I want to fulfill my dream of pretending I live in Stockholm then that’s my business.

If only the SAQ sold akvavit…

Filed under: Whatever