“There ought to be clowns – Well, maybe next year” are the haunting words at the end of the Stephen Sondheim song that is a lament using a circus metaphor. We were reminded of the song as we were reading and hearing about the American president’s travels this week. Is
Continue readingAuthor: Peter Lowry
Babel-on-the-Bay: No Intervention for Doug Ford.
Those people who are promoting an intervention for premier Doug Ford’s beer bonanza are missing a few clues. First of all, an intervention is normally conducted by people who give a damn about the person who has strayed. Secondly, we figure that an intervention over beer and wine is for
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: No party politics for Jane n’ Jody.
It had been puzzling many of us just where former liberals Jane Philpott and Jody Wilson-Raybould got the crazy idea of running as independent candidates. Neither had shown much political savvy during the SNC-Lavalin fiasco. When they chose to run as independents, all we could do was assume they got
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Opportunity calling Andrew Scheer.
For a guy who got his job by surprise, conservative leader Andrew Scheer MP is a happy camper. He can hardly believe it when public opinion polls show him defeating liberal leader Justin Trudeau. All he could do two years ago when he got the job of leading the party
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: How Justin Trudeau can win.
There is a summer of barbeque season to go before Canadians get into the cut and thrust of a federal election. And it is certainly to soon to say who might win. It is even to soon to consider the odds for a morning line. What we can do is
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: ‘None of the Above’ is not an option.
There seems to be some disquiet across this fair land over our lack of good choices in the looming federal election. And whose fault is that? Frankly, Canadians have been encouraging mediocrity in politics for far too long. We have been trashing our political parties. We have been lying to
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: It’s Bullshit over Beer in Ontario.
The international owners of Labatt, Molson and Sleeman breweries have to be sleeping on the job. The Ontario government is seriously planning to expand their business for them and they are talking about suing the government. If I was the judge for that case, I would laugh the idiots out
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Professionalism in Politics.
Interesting argument the other day with a reader who likes keeping up with the political scene and who supports the liberals. He was stating his objection to professional politicians. Since his major experience with a professional politician was when Patrick Brown was the MP in Barrie and then the leader
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Profiling politicians.
It is often amusing in the popular American TV program Criminal Minds when one of the actors, playing the part of an FBI agent, without much script support, out of the blue, says it is time to deliver the profile. They remind me very much of how our political commentators
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Defining a different destiny.
Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott have chosen their political destiny. They have chosen the path to likely political oblivion. There are few politicians who have come back from the Coventry of parliament to survive as an independent. To run as independent candidates is an ‘All-in’ bet. The two former liberal
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Kenney’s Conundrum, Capturing Carbon.
It was in the business news recently. It was about the success of Shell Oil’s $1.3 billion carbon-capture plant, Quest, near Edmonton. The Quest plant is designed to capture and store carbon from the Scotford upgrader, a refinery that upgrades tar sands bitumen into synthetic crude oil. The Scotford upgrader
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Ignoring Bernier is bad advice.
It amuses me that people are telling Andrew ‘Chuckles’ Scheer that former conservative MP Maxime Bernier is not a problem. That is bad advice. First of all, you have to ignore the pollsters who are having trouble measuring Bernier’s support. And then you have to understand the people who would
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Fighting the facts of the future.
In a discussion of what is currently happening in politics, the realization emerged that provincial politicians such as Alberta’s Kenney, Saskatchewan’s Moe and Ontario’s Ford are denying our progeny a future. It was not a question of a planned or malevolent denial of a future but simple ignorance. These men
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Scheer would do better if he shut up.
Sure, it is almost five months until the federal election but everyone is out stumping anyway. You would swear that the election was in June and everyone is getting desperate. But there is no excuse possible for the blather we are getting from the conservatives. Who told conservative leader Andrew
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Choosing Chuckles for Canadians?
Of all the ridiculous strategies for the coming federal election! Why should the liberals attack the conservatives when their real opposition in the October election is themselves? To waste time attacking conservative leader and Saskatchewan MP Andrew Scheer is assuming that he concerns Canadians. He never has been the problem.
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Poison Ivy is also Green.
It has been very difficult to decipher exactly what Green party leader Elizabeth May has in mind. Our Ottawa parliamentarians were in an emergency debate on the climate emergency our scientists had reported. Being head of the Green party, Ms. May came out with a program to save the world—or,
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: War Rooms from the political past.
It started back in the late 1970s and 80s when Senator Keith Davey, some of us liberal apparatchiks and the marketing communications experts, who volunteered their time, started to look on other parties as enemy combatants. I was even quoting Carl von Clausewitz’ On War when talking about campaigning to
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: The Donald loves Conrad.
This is priceless. After serving just three and a half years of his sentence in the United States for fraud and obstruction of justice, Lord Black of Cross-the Pond (or whatever) has been fulsomely pardoned by the U.S. president. There you have it. All is forgiven. Conrad Black is no
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Danger signs of elitism in the Senate.
Prime minister Justin Trudeau is facing enough problems without his elitism coming back to bite his ass. We saw in the Senate last week where one of his elite appointees forgot who appointed her to the sinecure of the Senate. Supposedly independent senator Paula Simons from Alberta torpedoed the liberal
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Fake news on the opioid front?
We were reading a poster telling us about a community meeting to discuss a proposed safe injection site in the neighbourhood. It invited anyone who wanted more information or had concerns to come to the meeting. We had barely finished reading when a voice behind us said, “It’s all a
Continue reading