Hello neglected readers. This was a very popular blog site at one time. I went into a job based out of Fort McMurray with the oil sands industry that made this kind of blogging difficult. Anything I said could and would (but not should) be interpreted as speaking on behalf of certain oil sands companies. Not fair to them...or me! But such is life.
A New Job and a New Blog:
I have a new life now and a new position at Edmonton Economic Development and blogging is mandated there not discouraged. My mandate is to increase the collaboration between the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo and the Edmonton Capital Region in areas of business, sustainability and community well-being.
Part of the EED mandate is going to be covered in another blog about the Edmonton area involvement in the oil sands using the triple bottom line and sustainability principles. Edmontonians are owners of the oil sands and need to know more on how we can take care ensure the oil sands are developed in a responsible sustainable and sensible way.
We need to take our citizenship obligations seriously and demand from government and industry that oil sands resource development be more sustainable. We need to expect optimizing oil sands be for the general well-being of people. We need to expect our oil sands deliver enhanced environmental stewardship. We deserve development that is less wasteful and more profitable for the posterity of future Albertans.
I have a new blog to serve that purpose and I hope you visit regularly at www.oilsandsken.com.
I have a hankering to re-engage in the Edmonton social media scene after an absence of way over 2 years. I have some catching up to do!
The Refocus of This Blog:
I hope this blog is a link between the communities and people of Edmonton and Fort McMurray. I have realized that there is a lot of myth and misinformation about life in McMurray within Edmonton.
I love both communities and want to help enhance the collaborative relationships and expand the appreciation and understanding of what great things the two regions can do together for mutual benefit and the greater good.
This blog is to become a focal point for that end. Of course I will be opinionated but I will also be informed and hopefully sufficiently authoritative to be worthy of your time and trust.
Wednesday, January 01, 2014
Saturday, June 29, 2013
Mr. Prime Minister: Promote Philanthropy - Stop Playing Politics
I just read Brett Wilson's National Post opinion piece on the HarperCons "boys in short pants in the PMO" manufactured manipulation over Justin Trudeau charging fees for speaking at charity events.
He deals with the substance of this issues of promoting philanthropy through speaking engagements. It is worth a read and reflection. I agree with him.
As for the politically motivations of our Prime Minister using this bullying as a deflection device is a feeble in effective attempt to divert attention from the moral corruption in his leadership. The permanent drop in his support amongst Canadians shows we have had enough of his affinity for US style dirty-trick politics.
It is time for political leadership in Canada that is dedicated to the greater good and not just committed to suppressing democracy to retain personal political power.
He deals with the substance of this issues of promoting philanthropy through speaking engagements. It is worth a read and reflection. I agree with him.
As for the politically motivations of our Prime Minister using this bullying as a deflection device is a feeble in effective attempt to divert attention from the moral corruption in his leadership. The permanent drop in his support amongst Canadians shows we have had enough of his affinity for US style dirty-trick politics.
It is time for political leadership in Canada that is dedicated to the greater good and not just committed to suppressing democracy to retain personal political power.
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Robocall Fraud Coming Home to Roost on the Harper Government?
Looks like the boy the Conservative Party threw under the bus on the Guelph Robocall scandal is not going quietly into the night. Michael Sona spoke out recently in a very extensive interview with journalist Michael Harris. If convicted Sona goes to jail. His description of how controlling the Harper War Room was in the past election makes you wonder why anyone with self respect would volunteer for such abuse.
If you want a first person perspective on the Harper campaign machine and its machinations from someone who was there you want to read the Harris column in iPolitics.
Here is the money quote from Sona:
“I’ve learned three things from the Robocall Affair. Talking points aren’t always right; friends are fickle when you get in trouble; and I trusted the Conservative Party way too much. And one other thing. I’m ready to fight now and I’m ready to win.”
Expect as many tricks as there are in the CPC book of tricks on how to thwart justice by delaying the trial any way they can. Delay tactics is how they handled the original Robocall trial that found the Conservative Party lists were use for election fraud. The evidence was too sparse to prove who actually did it. One would think ethics and integrity would dictate that the Conservative Party would be working really hard to help find and expose the fraudster who misused their political lists.
So far there is not a peep from the Conservative Party to indicate they are engaged in any way to help the RCMP find the fraudster.
Not a good way for the Conservative Party to show citizens they want to help restore voter confidence in how they do politics. Even OJ said he would do everything in his power to find who really killed his wife.
If you want a first person perspective on the Harper campaign machine and its machinations from someone who was there you want to read the Harris column in iPolitics.
Here is the money quote from Sona:
“I’ve learned three things from the Robocall Affair. Talking points aren’t always right; friends are fickle when you get in trouble; and I trusted the Conservative Party way too much. And one other thing. I’m ready to fight now and I’m ready to win.”
Expect as many tricks as there are in the CPC book of tricks on how to thwart justice by delaying the trial any way they can. Delay tactics is how they handled the original Robocall trial that found the Conservative Party lists were use for election fraud. The evidence was too sparse to prove who actually did it. One would think ethics and integrity would dictate that the Conservative Party would be working really hard to help find and expose the fraudster who misused their political lists.
So far there is not a peep from the Conservative Party to indicate they are engaged in any way to help the RCMP find the fraudster.
Not a good way for the Conservative Party to show citizens they want to help restore voter confidence in how they do politics. Even OJ said he would do everything in his power to find who really killed his wife.
Sunday, June 23, 2013
Edward Snowden, Freedom and the Media's Manufacture of Meaning
There is no doubt there is a need for fear, or at least anxiety, over our government's secret intrusion into our online personal lives. Yes the Government of Canada too, not just the United States, is doing this.
Reassurances from those perpetuating this travesty say that the surveillance is only on foreigners, not citizens is hardly reassuring nor very genuine. Those communications monitorings are ostensibly only on foreigners. But foreigners connecting with whom? American citizens is often as not the the answer. For Homeland security that is what the US spy system is mostly interested, I expect.
This makes the sincerity of the governments of the United States and Canada reassurances as to who is really being targeted by government invasion of privacy activities kind of, shall we say, "incredulous?" No wonder the USA is having trouble getting these "foreign" nations to cooperate with them in extraditing Snowden. A collaboration culture is hard to create with these "foreigner" nations, when their citizens and institutions are admittedly being spied on by the America government.
If Snowden is right, and I've seen no official rebuttal yet, those nameless anonymous government operatives who are doing the online surveillance searches of email, cellphone calls etc., they only need a personal confidence rating of 51% that they are not dealing with an American citizen in order to proceed. That puts a very low bar on standards of reasonable doubt don't you think? Since we don't know what metrics are actually being used to test what is involved in the 51% "confidence" (sic) level, it all seems to be so much manipulative Orwellian double speak. It make the integrity of surveillance process entirely ridiculous, especially when it to making claims that only foreigners are the targets of this official invasion of privacy practice.
Yes the world is still a dangerous complex place and American soil is not sacrosanct from invasion, even by their own fundamentalists citizens as it turns out. So more than a decade after 9-11 we are still seeing our governments use fear over reason, secrecy over solutions, and, dare I say, fascism over democracy to justify further denial and erosion of personal freedoms.
Freedom! That great American concept that motivated the G.W Bush government to take aggressive measures and to use freedom as justification for invading Iraq and Afghanistan. He wanted to give those poor folks the gift of American freedom...through invasion. It would appear that the great American concept of freedom is what drove Snowden to choose to jeopardize his personal freedom. He exercised personal freedom and came to a personal judgement, as a matter of democratic principle, when he decided to expose the US government secret abuses of freedom. He also created a space for that very necessary conversation to take place about the place of personal privacy and freedom for American citizens. That conversation needs to be open, candid and public, especially so when it has to consider their government's role to protect personal freedoms,....or ignore personal freedoms....or worse yet, abuse them.
The American government is clearly flummoxed about what to do since being "caught" in this secret underhanded system of what appears to be an unprecedented invasions of domestic and foreign personal privacy. They find the facts are against them. The law, while not strictly against them, is in serious disrepute. And so they revert to calling Snowden names like traitor and pathetic gestures like canceling his Passport.
And where is the media in all of this? Well the Guardian in the UK is doing the job. Check out their coverage. But where is the American media? I hope this video clip of David Gregory's alamaring questioning Glen Greenwald of the Guardian on Meet the Press is not a representative sample of where mainstream American media is positioning itself in all of this. If so then freedom of the press in the USA is also as good as gone, at least so far as its independent role of being the public's eyes, ears, and sense-makers and narrative makers is concerned.
Reassurances from those perpetuating this travesty say that the surveillance is only on foreigners, not citizens is hardly reassuring nor very genuine. Those communications monitorings are ostensibly only on foreigners. But foreigners connecting with whom? American citizens is often as not the the answer. For Homeland security that is what the US spy system is mostly interested, I expect.
This makes the sincerity of the governments of the United States and Canada reassurances as to who is really being targeted by government invasion of privacy activities kind of, shall we say, "incredulous?" No wonder the USA is having trouble getting these "foreign" nations to cooperate with them in extraditing Snowden. A collaboration culture is hard to create with these "foreigner" nations, when their citizens and institutions are admittedly being spied on by the America government.
If Snowden is right, and I've seen no official rebuttal yet, those nameless anonymous government operatives who are doing the online surveillance searches of email, cellphone calls etc., they only need a personal confidence rating of 51% that they are not dealing with an American citizen in order to proceed. That puts a very low bar on standards of reasonable doubt don't you think? Since we don't know what metrics are actually being used to test what is involved in the 51% "confidence" (sic) level, it all seems to be so much manipulative Orwellian double speak. It make the integrity of surveillance process entirely ridiculous, especially when it to making claims that only foreigners are the targets of this official invasion of privacy practice.
Yes the world is still a dangerous complex place and American soil is not sacrosanct from invasion, even by their own fundamentalists citizens as it turns out. So more than a decade after 9-11 we are still seeing our governments use fear over reason, secrecy over solutions, and, dare I say, fascism over democracy to justify further denial and erosion of personal freedoms.
Freedom! That great American concept that motivated the G.W Bush government to take aggressive measures and to use freedom as justification for invading Iraq and Afghanistan. He wanted to give those poor folks the gift of American freedom...through invasion. It would appear that the great American concept of freedom is what drove Snowden to choose to jeopardize his personal freedom. He exercised personal freedom and came to a personal judgement, as a matter of democratic principle, when he decided to expose the US government secret abuses of freedom. He also created a space for that very necessary conversation to take place about the place of personal privacy and freedom for American citizens. That conversation needs to be open, candid and public, especially so when it has to consider their government's role to protect personal freedoms,....or ignore personal freedoms....or worse yet, abuse them.
The American government is clearly flummoxed about what to do since being "caught" in this secret underhanded system of what appears to be an unprecedented invasions of domestic and foreign personal privacy. They find the facts are against them. The law, while not strictly against them, is in serious disrepute. And so they revert to calling Snowden names like traitor and pathetic gestures like canceling his Passport.
And where is the media in all of this? Well the Guardian in the UK is doing the job. Check out their coverage. But where is the American media? I hope this video clip of David Gregory's alamaring questioning Glen Greenwald of the Guardian on Meet the Press is not a representative sample of where mainstream American media is positioning itself in all of this. If so then freedom of the press in the USA is also as good as gone, at least so far as its independent role of being the public's eyes, ears, and sense-makers and narrative makers is concerned.
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
Population Changes; Will They Change Canada?
Stats Canada reports the national population increased by 85,500 in the first Quarter of 2013. The ratio is 3 to 1 of population coming from immigration compared to internal growth. The national average growth is .02% a rate that aligns with Ontario, Quebec, BC and Manitoba.
In real numbers new immigrants totaled 62,700 which was 4,600 more than Qtr1 of 2012. The net flow of "non-permanent resident immigrants" (a technical term for Temporary Foreign workers?) was 14,900 in Qtr1 of 2013 versus 12,900 in Qrt1 of 2012. That said our natural population sources were down 6.8% in 2013 from 2012.
The national figures are interesting but the provincial figures tell us more about the trends in the country. What those population shifts mean is the really interesting stuff of these stats. The core story is the continuing shift of population (and power?) to Alberta. It is only about the first quarter of 2013 but the facts are telling.
Newfoundland is stable and PEI is down 200 folks. Nova Scotia lost 1,800 people to net migration to other places in Canada. Actually 1,100 Nova Scotians moved to Alberta in the first three months this year. New Brunswick lost 700 folks to Alberta in the same time frame. Jobs are still the attraction to Alberta. The unanswered question are these Maritimers moving to the oil sands or are they flying in and flying out? My sense is they moved so there is even more "migration" when you consider the fly in-fly out folks who still consider home to be in the Maritimes.
Central Canada is growing modestly but Quebec tells an interesting story. Quebec grew past 8 million with comparable year to year growth of 14,100 new citizens, but 11,700 came from international immigration sources. That is the second highest level in Quebec history, the highest level of international immigrants came in 1992. Quebec is not losing many people to other parts of Canada either, only 900, the smallest out-migration since 2005.
Ontario is also growing at the national average. There are over 13.5 m Canadians living in Ontario, up 22,700 in the first quarter of 2013, but hat is the lowest growth there since 1972. International migration is up 1000 compared to 2013 but Ontario lost 6000 people to Alberta in the same time frame.
B.C. is up 10,100 folks year over year, aligned with the 0.2% national average with 9,800 being international immigrants, but 3,400 of them are actually non-permanent resident types. B.C. also lost 2,500 people to Alberta in the first 90 days of 2013.
Saskatchewan and Alberta tell a very different story. Saskatchewan grew 0.4% in the quarter mostly international migration which was at its second highest level in 2012 since 1972 and 2013 became the new second level of international immigration. People are returning to the province, not leaving it.
Alberta is a case study very different from the rest. We grew by 34,000 which is 0.9% of a population just shy of 4 million now. This is the highest Alberta growth rate since 1972. It comes from international immigration of 8,100, non-permanent immigrants of 6,900. We have a net migration from within Canada of 13,400 mostly from Ontario and B.C.
This continuing shift to Alberta is about jobs and the economic influence of the oil sands. Even may jobs staying in the rest of Canada are driven by oil sands development. This is good and bad news for Alberta. We have serious skilled labour shortages but the Stats Can numbers don't tell us if the migrants to Alberta are skilled. They also don't come with their houses, schools, hospital beds or other infrastructure requirements. The growth infrastructure in Fort McMurray is already an unaddressed crisis. This population shift means it get worse unless provincial political attitudes about investing in public infrastructure changes - and dramatically.
In real numbers new immigrants totaled 62,700 which was 4,600 more than Qtr1 of 2012. The net flow of "non-permanent resident immigrants" (a technical term for Temporary Foreign workers?) was 14,900 in Qtr1 of 2013 versus 12,900 in Qrt1 of 2012. That said our natural population sources were down 6.8% in 2013 from 2012.
The national figures are interesting but the provincial figures tell us more about the trends in the country. What those population shifts mean is the really interesting stuff of these stats. The core story is the continuing shift of population (and power?) to Alberta. It is only about the first quarter of 2013 but the facts are telling.
Newfoundland is stable and PEI is down 200 folks. Nova Scotia lost 1,800 people to net migration to other places in Canada. Actually 1,100 Nova Scotians moved to Alberta in the first three months this year. New Brunswick lost 700 folks to Alberta in the same time frame. Jobs are still the attraction to Alberta. The unanswered question are these Maritimers moving to the oil sands or are they flying in and flying out? My sense is they moved so there is even more "migration" when you consider the fly in-fly out folks who still consider home to be in the Maritimes.
Central Canada is growing modestly but Quebec tells an interesting story. Quebec grew past 8 million with comparable year to year growth of 14,100 new citizens, but 11,700 came from international immigration sources. That is the second highest level in Quebec history, the highest level of international immigrants came in 1992. Quebec is not losing many people to other parts of Canada either, only 900, the smallest out-migration since 2005.
Ontario is also growing at the national average. There are over 13.5 m Canadians living in Ontario, up 22,700 in the first quarter of 2013, but hat is the lowest growth there since 1972. International migration is up 1000 compared to 2013 but Ontario lost 6000 people to Alberta in the same time frame.
B.C. is up 10,100 folks year over year, aligned with the 0.2% national average with 9,800 being international immigrants, but 3,400 of them are actually non-permanent resident types. B.C. also lost 2,500 people to Alberta in the first 90 days of 2013.
Saskatchewan and Alberta tell a very different story. Saskatchewan grew 0.4% in the quarter mostly international migration which was at its second highest level in 2012 since 1972 and 2013 became the new second level of international immigration. People are returning to the province, not leaving it.
Alberta is a case study very different from the rest. We grew by 34,000 which is 0.9% of a population just shy of 4 million now. This is the highest Alberta growth rate since 1972. It comes from international immigration of 8,100, non-permanent immigrants of 6,900. We have a net migration from within Canada of 13,400 mostly from Ontario and B.C.
This continuing shift to Alberta is about jobs and the economic influence of the oil sands. Even may jobs staying in the rest of Canada are driven by oil sands development. This is good and bad news for Alberta. We have serious skilled labour shortages but the Stats Can numbers don't tell us if the migrants to Alberta are skilled. They also don't come with their houses, schools, hospital beds or other infrastructure requirements. The growth infrastructure in Fort McMurray is already an unaddressed crisis. This population shift means it get worse unless provincial political attitudes about investing in public infrastructure changes - and dramatically.
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