Public health measures problems

From the Canadian Encyclopedia: “In the 19th and early 20th centuries, public health was concerned with quarantine measures and emphasized improved sanitation and vaccination campaigns that were initiated in an attempt to control major infectious diseases.”

The creation of special agencies concerned with public health followed and officers of these agencies were given special powers to issue public health orders in regards to regulating public behaviour.

Seems to make sense, but a problem arose during the Covid pandemic which has its roots in the professional backgrounds of most of the people working in public health agencies: The higher echelons are doctors and nurses that have emigrated from the sick care system and so have brought their attitudes and beliefs with them into their new jobs.

Their preoccupation as public health operatives therefore became the preservation of the sick care system as we understand it, i.e. overcrowded hospitals. The overall health of the public became a secondary concern, resulting in public loss of confidence in the ability of these people to deal with a health crisis.

As a society we have paid dearly for this failure of the public health system, with the integrity of the whole medical profession being questioned.

It will take many years, if ever, for that confidence to be restored.

Deer Park

I live in a 100 acre wood, 20 of which belong to me and 16 acres being a municipal reserve set off for public use. The surrounding fields are mostly used for hay cropping by local farmers.

Having retired from 30 years of raising German Shepherds, and only retaining three dogs as pets, my place in the bush has become decidedly more quiet of late, a fact not lost on the local deer hanging around.

In the summer of 2021 I created about 1.5 kilometres of track through my bush, wide enough for my truck, in order to access standing dead trees for winter firewood, another fact not lost on the local deer.

This year the farmer’s field to the east also happened to have hay bales left sitting on the ground until the end of November, which the local deer really appreciated.

Result: 20 acres of deer trampled snow and surrounding roads impregnated with hunters’ truck tire marks, and a shot into my yard to top it all off.

Anyway, the deer using my property are pretty happy, judging from them still hanging around on an ideal “can’t catch me!” piece of land.

Prince Justin's holiday

Reportedly. Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is set to spend a week in Jamaica with his family, compliments of the Royal Canadian Air Force (that is us, taxpayers), skipping all the nasty weather Canadians and Americans are having to put up with, including power outages, untrafficable roads and grounded aircraft.

This is perfectly in line with previous behaviour, like ignoring the first Indigenous Truth and Reconciliation Day on September 30, 2021, going surfing at Tofino on Vancouver Island instead. And that’s only one in a long list of behaviours indicating his self centred behaviour and indifference to others.

His ego likely took a huge hit when his minders persuaded him to go into hiding in a cottage in the woods as the Freedom convoy approached Ottawa back in February. At that time he became the laughing stock of better than half of all Canadians.

(Reminds me of the time when Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser appeared in the lobby of a Memphis, Tennessee hotel in his underpants in 1986. His wife back in Australia was said to have dealt with the situation : )))

Anyway, I think Prince Justin knows that he is set to be replaced by Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre following the next federal election, and frankly don’t care what anybody thinks about him.

What amazes me and makes me hopeful for the future is that the people who put Justin Trudeau into the PM’s chair didn’t have the brains to know what they were dealing with.

Feedstock of war

Leader of the Kyiv regime Zelensky’s visit to Washington today is a clear marker of an escalation in the conflict of two empires, in Ukraine.
The Western Empire under the leadership of unnamed operatives in New York, via the Biden administration, and Putin’s gang in the Kremlin.

The feedstock on the Ukrainian side is both military personnel and civilians, with Russian soldiers on the other side. None of them want to be there, each one with a ticket to the hereafter.

Meanwhile, the political operatives use them as pawns in their power game, including taxpayers that fund this evil enterprise.

To agree or not agree

That is the question. Much is made of the idea of “democracy” these days. An arrangement where people agree to be ruled by the will of the majority for the sake of the common good. And compensate, within reason, those that are adversely affected by decisions, like loss of land compensation for land use decisions, for example.

For the last 100 years or so we in the west have been playing the “democracy game”, pretending that we live by those lofty rules, respect them and act accordingly in public life.

Our democracy model is supposed to be based on that of the ancient Greeks, where citizens took turns, by way of elections, to run civil society. What is not talked about very much is that Greek ‘civilized’ society was based on slaves, captured in wars and traded as commodities.

While some of our ‘slaves’ (low cost labour) have an opportunity to vote, they are relatively easily manipulated to enable the existing power backroom groups to get what they want, at the expense of those voters.

But now things are beginning to unravel for those that so ardently advocate for ‘democracy’ and this process has been accelerated by the Covid pandemic with the medical and media establishments parting ways with the population at large.

An increasing number of people are now simply refusing to cooperate with the powers that be, because they see them as being self serving ideologues. Political divisions are deepening and the underlying agreements necessary for a functioning ‘democracy’ are evaporating.

Where does it all go? Time to hit the restart button?

Ukrainian refugees

Ukrainian refugees
Following intensified Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure, Norwegian news sources this morning report that an increased outflow of refugees from Ukraine should be expected: Apartment buildings cannot be heated by wood fires.

The Kremlin is trying to terrorize civilians and cause chaos within Ukraine in order to remove their rivals in Kyiv.

Alberta is well positioned to receive more Ukrainian refugees with a strong economy and a large existing expatriate Ukrainian population.
And we need more workers to fill existing vacant positions.

Labour shortages

Reports abound about labor shortages across the world and here in Canada. The baby boomers are getting old and they did not procreate like generations before them.

So, here we are, with lots of money in the bank and fewer and fewer servants. The Romans had similar problems in the first and second centuries AD. That was one of the reasons for their extensive conquests of other lands: Slaves were one of the main booties of these campaigns and were considered to be major assets to their owners.

In a more (maybe not) civilized world, labor is being imported to wealthy countries, with a minimum of civil rights granted, and sent back to poverty in their home countries when no longer needed.

Sometimes I think the slaves of antiquity got a better deal. They were considered to be assets rather than consumables.

Realizing where things are heading, Canada’s government has now increased new permanent resident targets to 465,000 in 2023, 485,000 for 2024 and 500,000 in 2025.

The risk is that these new residents, along with a lot of us, will become part of a growing underclass, increasingly rebellious against the money hoarders, for whom they/we have little or no respect.

Letter to Council

Marianne Cole, President Clearwater County Taxpayers’ Association RR #1 Rocky Mtn. House, AB T4T 2A1 mcmajic@telus.net

Mr. Daryl Lougheed, Reeve Clearwater County Box 550 Rocky Mtn. House, AB T4T 1A4 dlougheed@clearwatercounty.ca December 13, 2022

Dear Reeve Lougheed and County Councillors:

I am writing this letter on behalf of the Clearwater County Taxpayers’ Association as a supplement to my earlier letter of November 15, 2022. We feel it is very important that the points noted here be addressed at the December 20, 2022 County Council meeting as you consider First Reading of the Municipal Development Plan draft.

1. Facts to Consider

· 78% of the people who responded to the county’s survey were in favor of only 1 subdivision out of a quarter.

· 64% were opposed to two parcels out.

· The majority of comments expressed during meetings opposed extra subdivisions, with a focus on potential negative impacts on agricultural operations as well as community services.

· Serious concerns were expressed over the potential loss of food producing land.

· Our current MDP allows only 1 subdivision per quarter with 5 acres maximum size.

· The proposed MDP draft would allow 2 subdivisions with a total of 15 acres out. That is three times the current allowable land to be removed from a quarter.

· A “recommendation” from administration (as per the What We Heard Report) suggests a maximum of 25 subdivisions be allowed per year. Apparently Council is proposing only 20 be allowed.

· If the number and size (as per the current MDP) were to be maintained, a total of only 100 acres (5 x 20) could be removed from potentially farmable land per year.

· BUT, if the proposed numbers are used (15 acres x 20 subdivisions) 300 acres could be removed each year. Multiply that times the 4 years this plan could be in effect and 1200 acres of productive land could be lost.

2. Responsibility to Constituents

According to the Municipal Government Act, Section 153, “Councillors have the following duties: (a) to consider the welfare and interests of the municipality as a whole..” This would suggest that you consider the majority of opinion. It is important to note:

· During the review process Council supported various opportunities to gather public opinion, namely in-person town hall meetings, virtual on-line meetings, and a written survey.

· Throughout all of these activities the most common opinion expressed was opposition to an increase in number of subdivisions (along with the allowable size) out of a quarter.

· Rationale supporting that opposition focussed on:

Ø Negative impact on agricultural operations, the primary activity in our county

Ø The loss of valuable food producing land

Ø Concern with negative impact on community services such as road maintenance, school bus safety, and emergency services.

· All of the public engagement activities involved significant costs for hall rentals, consultant wages, staff time, advertising and miscellaneous expenses.

· As these expenses were funded by taxpayer dollars, it is crucial that their voices be heard. If you ignore the majority of public opinion expressed through the above activities, you have not only wasted money, but devalued the input of the very people who placed their confidence in you during the past election.

3. Questionable Responses

Throughout this whole review process we have heard comments and responses from not only the public but also administration and Council. Some of these have raised the following questions/concerns:

· There is a desire to have more acreages allowed for family members/estate planning. While this may be considered a cooperative action, it was not a majority issue. Furthermore, it is not the County’s duty to be involved with estate planning. That is a personal responsibility to be addressed throughout life.

· We have heard comments from Council that the CCTA is only a small group and does not represent the majority. First of all we generally sell 25-30 memberships per year. There are usually 15-20 people attending every meeting and there are currently 59 on our email list. As such these numbers are greater than any county committee involved in making decisions for the county. Furthermore, our members come from all areas of the county. They are involved in those areas and hear very valuable comments from their neighbors. Consequently, the comments that we make are representative of a large number of county residents.

· We have also heard comments negating the value of farmland in our county. While we may not have a large amount of profitable grain producing land we are well known for our forage production and very valuable grazing opportunities. People from all over central Alberta bring their cattle out here for summer pasture.

· While there seems to be an increasing concern elsewhere with the loss of food producing land, this does not seem to be a matter of consideration by our administration or potentially Council as well. Food is one of the necessities of life and every effort should be taken to ensure

adequate future supply. It would be great to have our county value this need as much as neighboring jurisdictions along with those promoting RAMP (the Regional Agricultural Management Plan) in the Edmonton area.

· We have also heard the financial argument used to promote the need for increased taxes gathered from acreages. While the financial outlook in this county did take a brief downturn, there has been a positive upsurge in the oil industry that will have positive impacts into the future. In addition, as of October 31, 2022 revenues for 2022 were $2,237,397 over budget. I also remind you of the very large amount of taxpayer dollars that are sitting in restricted reserves.

· Finally, we have repeatedly heard the comment from administration that “we get many inquiries for more acreages and bigger sizes.” This is a moot point as they are not going to hear opposing wishes on a daily basis. People are not going to walk into the county office to merely express an opinion about limiting acreage numbers or sizes. The only ones that would come in would be the ones that want something and they are certainly not in the majority.

4. Potential Action

At this December 20, 2022 County Council meeting you are provided with the opportunity for 3 possible actions:

· You may pass the current draft as presented. This would demonstrate publicly a distinct lack of value placed on the majority of opinions gathered during the process you promoted to guide you.

ü You may pass the current draft with amendments. We strongly suggest that you amend the sections dealing with subdivisions out of a quarter, reducing the number to 1 and the size to 5. Your survey results indicated 78% support for such amendments.

· You may defeat the motion to pass this current MDP draft completely but this would not be a positive move as it could result in significant delay and additional cost.

In conclusion we sincerely ask that Council pass amendments to the current Municipal Development Plan draft as noted above. These changes could be accomplished effectively, efficiently, and responsibly prior to 2nd Reading.

As you make your decision we trust that your dedication to the majority of your electorate will ultimately override personal opinions or desires, but reflect the true voice of the people.

Yours truly,

Marianne Cole

Cc: Deputy Reeve Mehlhaff, Councillors Graham, Northcott, Ratcliffe, Cermak, and Swanson, CAO Rick Emmons, and Executive Assistant Tracy Lynn Haight.

Humble aspen wood

Here in Western Canada spruce and pine rules the roost as far as preferred wood species for building goes. Dimensional lumber by the millions of board feet are produced on a regular basis and exported all over the world.

Shortly after arriving here in 1987, I took an interest in a deciduous species called “trembling aspen” that is also very common but not as highly regarded. In the building trade is is primarily used as feedstock for Oriented Strand Board (OSB) production and can now be found in that form in every modern home constructed.

Having faith in the value of this wood, I called my 40 acre wood “Aspenwood” when I settled here in 1991 and have enjoyed the protection and utility of this tree ever since.

Using chainsaws, I cut most of the dimensional lumber for my cabins from aspens right in the yard, and beyond for larger beams.

Results: Providing it is kept away from alternating wet and dry moisture, stopping the fungi from moving in, the wood is as good as it was 30 years ago. And that includes aspen shingles on one of my cabins, cut with a chainsaw and mounted on the cabin in 1992.

In fact, I have found that spruce and pine logs are more prone to dry rot (fungal infection) than aspen as they get wet and dry up again, creating ideal conditions for Nature’s Master Recycler: Freddy Fungus.

Grinding empires

Way back in the nineteen forties, George Orwell (Eric Blair) wrote the novel “1984” about a dystopian world where three empires were at perpetual war against each other with shifting alliances: Oceania, Eurasia and East Asia.

From the political map of today's world in 2022, there is an almost exact correspondence with existing power blocks: The Western Empire, Russia and China, and they are all competing with each other for power and influence across the world.

So Eric Blair knew exactly what he was writing about, as a former civil servant in the eastern parts of the declining British Empire of his day.

And we have now arrived with open conflict between the Western Empire and Russia in Ukraine, with intense propaganda on both sides of the conflict.

A good example being the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to anti Russian activists this year.

The slogans of Oceania in “1984” were: “War is Peace!”, “Freedom is Slavery!” and “Ignorance is Strength!” And then they had “Newspeak”, a politically correct language.

Sounds eerily familiar, eh?

War escalates

An indication of the pressure felt by the Kyiv regime can now be discerned in attacks on targets inside Russia, including airfields using Soviet era missiles.

This can be seen as a result of Kremlin initiated destruction of Ukrainian energy infrastructure, designed to ultimately topple the Kyiv regime.

I am deliberately not using the terms “Ukrainians” vs “Russians” because they are just the pawns in the game on both sides.

The Kyiv strategy is pretty obvious. Try to draw in the Western Empire, of which NATO is the military arm, by provoking Russia.

I don’t think that will happen as long as NATO members don’t supply Kyiv operatives with long range missiles. If that were to happen, all bets are off.

A brutal conflict where the dogs of war are doing their best to increase the bloodshed for their own profit.

My deer haven

I live on 20 acres of forest land sloping gently to the north in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Alberta, Canada – along with plenty of visiting wildlife, including foxes, coyotes, ravens and crows, lots of deer and the occasional bear and moose.

This year the deer have prevailed, after I cleared som 1+ kilometres of track though the dense undergrowth in July of last year. That following having multiple visits from two grizzly bears in August of 2020, resulting in the death of two of my German Shepherd dogs.

This has resulted in my property becoming a haven for local deer, with easy access to a farmers’ field to the east with plenty of feed to munch on, while retaining an ideal shelter in my now semi open bushland with high speed escape lanes provided.

So, this winter, instead of seeing untouched white snow in the bush, I’m out walking on a deer highway on my snowshoes, judging by all the tracks permeating the lanes.

During my clearing operations in 2021, I also came across two old bear skulls in the bush, indicating that this was a popular area with wildlife before my time.

On the positive side, the deer have saved my having to prune my rather extensive raspberry patch this fall but that came with a price:
A ‘hunter’ sitting in his truck on my subdivision road, took a shot at me in my yard early in the morning, likely seeing movement through the trees and figuring it was a deer.

So now I have posted “no hunting” signs along that road and have a bright light in my yard 24/7.

On reflection, the most dangerous animal on the landscape walks on two legs, and mostly sits in a truck, too lazy to get his arse into gear and do some real hunting.

Central Bank Monopoly

Most of us have played the monopoly game at some point, and have won or been bankrupted. It is a game of winner-takes-all and the loser walking away with nothing.

The trick is to acquire ownership of assets and making other players pay to use those assets, thereby moving money into your own hands.

At some point other players need to borrow money to pay their dues which puts them ever closer to losing the game. Players who buy assets may also choose to borrow money, at a calculated risk.

The background player in this game is the bank that supplies the money for the whole exercise and mirrors the role of the central bank in contemporary society.

Right now, the central banks of this world are rapidly increasing interest rates to borrowers, which are a whole bunch of commercial and investment banks, that in turn increase their interest rates payable by the consumers of loans issued by the banks.

The idea is to make it more risky to take out loans for new enterprises to cool down the economy and decrease price inflation.

The victims of this process are those that have large repayable loans and who can literally be forced to move out on the street as their loan repayment amounts increase, leaving them unable to meet their obligations.

So, they become victims of a central bank policy to discourage folks to buy things on credit/get loans, etc. And in the process being forced to use credit to survive in many cases.

This monopoly game in the real world has now become deadly serious for an increasing number of people, and those who have hoarded the assets and are milking the rest for what it is worth may be in for a nasty surprise if the other players decide to flip the monopoly game board upside down.

The basis for a civilized society is agreement on the rules between the players. If that is not present, civilization descends into a free-for-all might-is-right.

Phoney war?

The first 8 months of WWII has been labelled “The phoney war” by historians and have some parallels with the war in Ukraine at this time. Limited actions took place on the battle front and included the German invasions of Norway and Poland. After that the scale of operations increased steadily.

Will that happen in Ukraine? I don’t think so. It is just too convenient for both parties to keep the show rolling along with interest groups on both sides raking in enormous profits as the military hardware gets consumed and replacement hardware produced.

I find it rather interesting that Russian communities along the Ukraine/Russia border seem to be immune to attacks from Ukraine, as if some kind of deal had been struck between the Kyiv and Kremlin regimes.

On the other side, Ukrainians can now emigrate to virtually any country in the Western world, of their choosing, in contrast to other people. The Kyiv regime is also receiving billions of dollars with no strings attached from us taxpayers in the West.

Life in Ukraine seems to be going along pretty well as normal in spite of mainstream media reports to the contrary.

Do you smell a rat??

Pandemic lesson

Looking back at the Covid pandemic and government response to same, a lesson can be learned: Just listening to one voice, that of a spokesperson for the medical system, at the expense of other people in society was a big mistake.

Government response became limited to actions designed to protect the sick-treatment system from being overloaded and infringed on peoples’ basic liberties to go about their business.

The fallout has been considerable, across the world, deepening existing political divisions and causing great harm to the societal fabric.

Next time, the governments of the world need to consult with a much broader range of people before making major decisions on restricting individual freedoms.

The communist government in China is now finding that out the hard way: The normally compliant Chinese population has had enough of government interference.

Wastefulness

The hallmark of our ‘civilization’. Based on cheap abundant energy that, in turn, gives rise to gazilions of goods and services consumed by an ever increasing population with a seemingly insatiable appetite for more.

And then a bunch of people get together every year to complain and ruminate about what is going on, the latest being COP(out)27 in Egypt
where participants perpetuate the pattern of wasting energy by their very presence in luxury hotels and burning copious quantities of jet fuel, complaining about cows farting in distant fields.

A war starts in Europe and the world returns to two camps throwing bombs at one another and ramping up the armaments industry for the financial benefit of the few and suffering of many, consuming more and more fossil energy in the process.

The question is not if this shit show will end. The question is: “When?”

My advice: Get ready for sooner, rather than later.

Migration

Movement of people across the globe. As well as all kinds of other critters, including plants, animals and associated micro organisms.

As the artificially created and natural world around us changes, we are an integral part of that change and move along with it, in order to survive as a species.

That was true when glaciers encircled the world and continually changed and moved. We moved along with them and the plants and animals that kept us alive.

Also, when human populations increased due to fortuitous circumstances, we pushed each other around, competing for the best ‘pastures’.

Right now, Nature is doing a number on us, as the air masses that continually circulate around the globe are changing their behaviour.
And mass migrations will likely follow with all the attendant trauma experienced in the past.

On the plus side, the challenge to deal with that is built into our DNA from the endless migrations that have taken place in the past.

Gun bans

This is coming from someone who was recently shot at by a rogue trigger happy ‘hunter’: Canada’s government is continuing its ‘putsch’
to remove guns from the hands of Canadians by trying to implement sneaky administrative moves to avoid debating legislation in Parliament.

This is a hallmark of the present government and is continuing to alienate them from a large and growing segment of the population.
The attitude is grounded in a history of dictatorship in Canada by British appointed governors in the early days of colonization.

The idea of the gun bans is to effectively subjugate Canadians to the whims of a self appointed ‘elite’ that can then use its armed henchmen with impunity to impose the will of the few onto the many, as is done in totalitarian regimes, like China, Russia and other places.

Meanwhile the same people are flooding the world market with military weapons by providing Ukraine with an unlimited supply of same.

Ain’t gonna work, Prince Justin. Thanks for creating record sales of handguns and munitions in Canada with your antics.

Premier Smith's problem

Alberta’s new Premier Danielle Smith used to be a radio phone-in show host before becoming Premier and I used to listen to her program frequently.

She was very connected to her audience and had a hard time during the pandemic with folks that disagreed with her views, which included her employer as well on some issues.

Prior to working as a radio host Smith had been the leader of the Wildrose Party in Alberta and a sitting member of the legislative assembly. At that time she crossed the floor with a group of her MLAs to join the sitting Progressive Conservative Party government under Jim Prentice prior to an election in which she lost her seat.

Listening to her reflect on what happened, I got the distinct impression that Danielle Smith sees herself as some kind of “Knight in Shining Armour” coming to Alberta’s rescue with some ready baked solutions of her own choosing.

And therein lies her problem: Running with her instincts and preconceived ideas, without consulting the greater population.

Jim Prentice had the same problem, and he was a bad loser.

Hunting season

This morning I got to experience what it feels like to be a deer in the hunting season here in Alberta.

Walking between my two cabins this morning I heard a very sharp loud crack and saw a small spruce branch fall to the ground just beside me as I made for the cabin door and parked inside.

I didn’t take time to look around as this was obviously a rifle shot aimed at me. I phoned 911 and the RCMP were dispatched from Sundre shortly afterwards. I was told over the phone that they are investigating but have not heard back yet (afternoon).

Around noon I went out into the snow to investigate, looking for tracks. And I found them: Fresh large 4x4 wheel tracks on the subdivision road some 100 meters from my cabin, which is barely visible from that road at low light.

There were no human footprints next to the tracks, but there were a lot of deer tracks in the snow all around the subdivision road.

Back at my cabin I discovered where the broken branch had come from, just 2 feet above where my head was at the time of the shot.

So I surmised that some trigger happy good-for-nothing ‘hunter’ was sitting at the wheel of his rig looking for something to shoot at.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of stories like mine in Alberta, sometimes with fatal outcomes.

Ukraine war direction

The Russians have now settled on a strategy to bring the Ukrainian political establishment down: Keep pounding energy infrastructure to the point where the country becomes dysfunctional, in a modern sense.

And do it without losing a lot of Russian military personnel. The strategy adopted by the Russian army in Kherson makes perfect sense, moving across the river and posing a constant direct threat to the city’s population.

Looking at the map, Russian forces can be re-supplied from Russian controlled territory to the south, with the Dnipro River as an easily defendable barrier to the north.

This war will not be over for a long time because it is really a conflict between two empires, not as depicted in the Western media as a regional war between a small innocent nation and a big bully.

The Ukrainian people have become the meat in the sandwich and men between 18 and 60 years old are forced to serve under martial law enacted by the Kyiv government.

Is time circular

For periods in human history our world, the Earth, was believed to be flat, beginning somewhere and ending somewhere else. No one could believe that by going west, for example, for long enough, would have you back to where you started from if you kept going for a finite amount of time in the same direction.

Is our perception of Time similarly flawed? Is Time circular rather than linear? Are the incredible stone monuments we see, in Egypt, for example, our own constructs from sometime in the future created as a warning message to us here, now, using the technology currently at our command?

Or, were they created by an ancient advanced civilization that disappeared without any other traces way back in antiquity on the linear timeline inside our heads?

Just askin’ : )

Arctic warming fallout

Where I live in the high north weather events these last couple of years have seemed to be dragged out and amplified, both on the hot and cold end of the spectrum: Multi week hot spells in the summer and similar cold events in the winter.

An explanation for this is now being offered by scientific reports pointing to slower jet streams at the 10 kilometre altitude level around 60 degrees north of the equator.

The driver is accelerated air warming of the arctic in comparison to air at lower latitudes. As the earth spins, the strength of the jet stream that moves from west to east is determined by the temperature difference as the air masses meet and mingle.

Low and high pressure systems are captives of the jet stream and are moved along by it as it wiggles around the globe.

As the arctic keeps warming at an accelerating rate, the behaviour of these jet streams becomes increasingly unpredictable, as does the weather we are subjected to.

Precision and power

There is an ongoing debate over what happened in prehistoric times.
Was there an advanced earth spanning civilization in existence prior to some kind of calamity that allegedly happened 12-13,000 years ago?

That got wiped off the face of the earth, leaving only very sophisticated megalithic stone works as evidence of its existence.

Or, as mainstream historians claim, the sudden change in climatic conditions that took place some 12-13,000 years ago spurred humanity on to develop agriculture, rather than hunting and gathering because of a drastic reduction in available game?

If you closely examine the megalithic stone work in walls erected in the distant past, you are struck by the incredible precision used in fitting these stones together so as to make walls very resistant to major earthquakes.

That in contrast to more recent stone constructs using the old walls as a stable base.

The sheer size of the stones also dwarf more recently placed ones.
There seems to be an order of magnitude difference in both the precision and power used to create ancient, as compared to more contemporary stoneworks.

Looking at contemporary society, we can place a rover on Mars and observe what happens on the surface on that red planet on a daily basis because of the precision and power of our technology.

But the stoneworks we would leave behind if some kind of calamity was to happen would likely be mostly rubble in the form of decomposed concrete and major highway earthworks here and there.

So, I think we can say that if there was an ancient advanced civilization, it was very different from our present one.

Maybe they were giants? (Look at the size of the rooms in the ancient city of Petra : )

Time machines

Some 50 years ago Carl Sagan and Frank Drake already had some experience with sending messages out into space. They had created two gold-anodized aluminum plaques that were affixed to the Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11 spacecraft. Linda Salzman Sagan, an artist and Carl’s wife, etched an illustration onto them of a nude man and woman with an indication of the time and location of our civilization.

An interesting venture to say the least, sending a signal of human existence onto deep space and, potentially, time as well.

Here on earth we have human constructs, sent into deep time in the form of stone works, like pyramids and other stone structures that send messages of the incredible prowess of ancient civilizations, available for all to see.

These structures make us question what contemporary mainstream historians try to tell us about the past.

Taking this one step further, Moses was said to have been presented with two inscribed stone tablets by God, quite possibly on the semi precious blue lapis lazuli stone with the 10 commandments inscribed. Ensuring that the original message could be preserved for a very long time, in contrast to what could happen to messages on parchment, for example.

Now the question arises, how could someone like you or I send a lot of information into deep time with a good probability of it surviving intact for centuries, or even millennia?

The answer is very simple: By inscribing text and images on smaller pieces of window glass, using an engraving tool and packaging them in well protected bundles that are subsequently buried in places unlikely to be disturbed in the foreseeable future.

Copout

The annual UN sponsored Conference Of the Parties on climate is currently underway in Egypt. This is #27 in a line that started in 1995 with targets and promises being made – with no tangible result to date.

Meanwhile the show goes on as a way for world political hubas to show themselves off in front of world media cameras and the hosting country to present a positive face to the world, rather than its back yard.

From my perspective, there is no point in arguing with the observed data indicating that weather patterns are changing towards prolonged extreme weather events of both heat and cold and less average precipitation where I live in the North West part of Turtle Island.

Whatever you believe the primary cause to be, there is a marked change from what used to happen, especially here in the far north.

So, the question becomes: How do we adapt, in my situation, to more heat and less moisture?

The answer is pretty straight forward: Get smart about how to use fresh water. It is a no-brainer really. Here in Alberta we waste water as if the supply was unlimited with no thoughts for the future, waiting for the next dump of rain.

Trouble is, long term observed trends are that we are getting less all the time.

One of the main pillars of our economy, agriculture, is particularly sensitive to this, as most of our products come from dry land farming.

At the end of our last major drought here in Alberta, in 2002, I travelled in Central/East Alberta and didn’t see farmland. I saw a desert, which revived memories of what I saw in the desert of Syria and Iraq through which I passed in 1961.

Adapt or else...

Food as medicine

Not a new idea at all. Food is part of Traditional Chinese Medicine as a means to bringing the body and spirit into balance. As are herbs, acupuncture and other practices.

Herbal remedies are generally prepared by cooking herbs in water and then administering the ‘tea’ to the person being treated.

So I got to thinking: Here in the West we generally cook our vegetables, like potatoes, carrots and beets in water and then discard the liquid before serving up the now, soft vegetables.

In Chinese cooking the wok is generally used to stir fry vegetables quickly at high heat with spices added, which kills off harmful bacteria, but does not deprive the veggies of essential nutrients that are leached into the cooking fluid here in the West.

Accordingly, as someone who likes to preserve vegetables in jars for the winter, I use a small amount of vinegar added to the water and do not discard this liquid when I use the veggies. Instead I mix it with other juices, like orange juice and consume it as a cold drink.

Trying to adapt Western practices to Eastern smarts.

Being tribal

Family, clan, tribe – these are all clusters of individuals that form for the benefit of individual members. These groups take many forms: Bloodlines, religious/political beliefs, economic relationships and a mixture of those and many others.

One great motivator for being part of groups/networks is the human need to create a senses of security around oneself, belief wise and materially. The need to “belong” is the underlying glue of social groups.

We humans also prefer to have simple straight forward beliefs to hold on to, rather than complex ones, and therein lies a great weakness because Nature is extremely complex.

So, in order to feel comfortable we try to fit Nature (God, if you like) into simple belief systems that turns out to be very different from each other across the globe.

And there you are, a great recipe for war when the attendant economic benefits of domination after victory are made part of the equation.

One powerful form of modern tribalism is nationalism where a large group called a “nation” controlled by a state apparatus is presumed to have ultimate authority over the individual.

Today this idea is being increasingly challenged by people of multiple philosophical persuasions, from globalists to libertarians and a sense of foreboding is hardening beliefs on all sides.

As the vulnerabilities of the global economic/political/social organism that has been created during the last few centuries are being exposed by war and exploitation of natural resources, etc., would we be well advised to form smaller tribal groups for mutual protection?

Financial fly trap

The prevailing world financial system is essentially a giant fly trap, designed to entice people to enter and get trapped by cyclical booms and recession/depressions.

The money supply is controlled by central bankers who turn the monetary spigots on and off causing the value of money to fluctuate.

The private banking system also creates money by giving their customers credit in the form of loans. Availability of credit entices people into ventures to make money for themselves with attendant risks.

As the economy heats up with more money circulating central bankers increase interest rates to cool it down. People go broke and suffer economic hardships.

Over time the bigger fish survive at the expense of the smaller ones that are summarily gobbled up.

So we end up with a few mega billionaires and a whole bunch of paupers. The billionaires dream about a “Great Reset” in which the ‘unusable’ paupers perish and the billionaires prosper.

Sadly, (for the billionaires) History tells the opposite story: The peasants are the long term survivors. The fall of the Maya civilization is a good example of this.

UCP cracks?

Alberta’s new Premier, Danielle Smith is on record stating that she will dismiss/replace Alberta’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, Deena Hinshaw along with her board. That was part of her vote getting strategy in getting elected as UCP leader and become the new Premier of Alberta.

Problem is, members of her new cabinet were involved in giving Hinshaw a substantial monetary bonus for her performance during the Covid pandemic. This turned out to be very controversial at the time with calls for her removal as Chief Medical Officer of Health.

My take on the situation is that Hinshaw has been made into a punching bag by politicians on all sides of Covid/vaccination issues and hung out to dry in public.

And now Smith will have to deal with a potential rift in her carefully crafted cabinet without losing face with the public.

Good luck Danielle, as medical professionals continue to leave Alberta.

Water retention

I’m not talking about what happens when old farts like me have problems discharging their personal water. No, this is about enabling Mother Earth to retain the fresh water that comes down in the form of rain.

The key is intact vegetation with root systems that penetrate deep into the earth and provide a universe for microbial life.

Regrettably, most human practices on the land, achieve exactly the opposite result as land is cleared and used for innumerable reasons.

Overgrazing with livestock does the same thing, as humans sacrifice their future for short term gain.

Here in Canada, we have a great land engineer at our service that can help restore damaged ecosystems: Bertie Beaver, a much maligned rodent that builds dams on water courses, slowing down runoff after storms and so making water available to underground life forms of all kinds.

And that results in above ground life flourishing as well, including ourselves. All Bertie needs are some nice trees to feed on and build his dams from. Something that can readily be provided by us planting trees in desired dam areas over time.

We are finally beginning to learn the lessons from Nature on how to live in harmony with her, by now beginning to construct artificial beaver dams across smaller water courses, both here and in Australia, for example.

As usual, the Asians are way ahead of us with their terraced gardens along steep hillsides. For them, it was “do or die” way back in antiquity due to population pressures. It is all about capturing water before it has an opportunity to form streams that gouge out the hillsides and use it slowly to feed gardens and rice paddies.

We are now at that point here in the West.

Political trends

Political trends
Here in Alberta, and elsewhere, there is a marked trend towards the conservative side of the political spectrum. This Monday, Alberta’s new Premier, Danielle Smith will see her new ministers sworn into office by Alberta’s Lieutenant Governor, Salma Lakhani, after having won the UCP leadership race based on reaction to Federal Government overreach into provincial affairs.

Canada’s left leaning establishment and media failed to understand the political significance of the Freedom Convoy earlier in the year and dismissed the protesters as fringe radicals.

The same trend is also playing out in Europe and most recently in Italy where popular sentiments are swinging back towards the Mussolini era. The idea of having a ‘strong man’ in charge is resurfacing all over the place, with all its attendant problems, as can be seen in Russia under Putin.

Meanwhile, the power brokers in this world are busily readjusting their support strategies to keep up with political trends with the view to maintain their privileges.

Federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre is already under their umbrella and it will be interesting to see where Danielle Smith is heading.

It is all about getting into, and staying in power, after all. And you need powerful rich ‘friends’ for that to happen.

Too little, too late

Wanna live on Mars? Not me. It is the most God forsaken place I have ever seen images of. Endless expanses of mountains, rocks and dust and the sound of a lonely wind, moaning into the microphone of a Mars rover.

In 1961, as an 18 year old, I travelled with my dad across the desert between Damascus, Syria and Baghdad, Iraq in a little Opel car totally unsuited to the task. Luckily we managed to team up with a convoy of trucks making the same trip over a roadless landscape.

Travelling side by side with some 50 meters between each vehicle across the gravelly surface, we slowly made our way across another God forsaken land, sometimes traveling across hard baked old lake bed clay pans at much higher speeds.

Yes, there were lakes there a long time ago when the region supported a population of some 35 million people and an agricultural economy.

Historians consider it to be the birthplace of civilization, with empires coming and going over a period of several thousand years.

And look at it now, a Mars like landscape with a few hares jumping around in wetter spots, eking out a life there.

Is that where we are heading, wasting fresh water and energy as if there is no end to their availability at our fingertips? Here in Alberta, using some 60 million litres of fresh water to create one producing oil/gas well?

Does stupidity know no limits?

Weather woes

As I write this, on October 14, 2022, the Rocky Mountains to the west of me are bare of any snowcover whatsoever. The weather is just beautiful with 20 degree Celsius days behind us and stretching ahead.

Normally, at the beginning of September when school starts here in Alberta, the mountains have already received their first winter coat, gleaming in the morning sunshine.

A flood is a dramatic event causing havoc and chaos within few hours of happening. Then the cleanup begins and things slowly return to normal.

A drought is different. At first, everything seems to be the same as usual with deceptively benign weather, day in and day out: The last recorded rainfall in my rain gauge was 10 millimeters on August 28 and before that a total for the year of 284 mm, well below normal.

The bushland around me is tinder dry and a windy day and a spark is all it would take to create a local disaster. But more troubling are the long term implications if this weather pattern persists: Thousands of shallow water wells, including mine, along the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains can potentially dry up as groundwater levels go down.

Intermittent rainfall amounts so far this year have not exceeded 45 mm (under two inches), which is insufficient to recharge groundwater aquifers and only keeps the topsoil damp for a limited amount of time.

People to the east of the Rocky Mountains, both here in Alberta and on the prairies generally, rely on a melting snowpack in the mountains to recharge multiple dams and man made lakes to provide water for the upcoming summer season crops and for domestic/industrial use as well.

When will this weather pattern change to give us some wet manna from heaven?

Russia's war strategy

As the war in Europe escalates, Russia’s strategy is emerging. As a major energy, food and raw materials exporter to the rest of the world a prolonged war is in Russia’s interest, compared to its opponents who are, as we know, dependent on Russian exports.

During WWII Germany was chronically short of energy, food and raw materials, playing a part in the loss of that war to allied powers. Germany’s war strategy was also fundamentally flawed as it pursued war on many fronts simultaneously.

In that war the Russians wore down the Germans and beat them on the battle front with greater human and material resources to back them.

This time around, Russia has Europe, including Germany, in a position of energy dependency and is currently restricting exports to put the squeeze on the will of Europeans to support their own governments in what is an imperial war benefiting kleptocrats on all sides of the conflict.

So, it is reasonable to assume that this policy will be pursued with increased vehemence as time goes on, including the destruction of vulnerable energy infrastructure, as can already be seen in Ukraine itself.

Western propaganda depicting Russia as a crumbling state is just wishful thinking. When really threatened, as seen in WWII, Russians stood shoulder to shoulder even if they didn’t like their government of the day.

War intensification

Some 20 years ago I was involved in organizing Canada Day festivities in our local Village of Caroline and the question of fireworks at the end of the day was discussed.

I distinctly remember the reaction of Pat, a local elderly English lady. She objected vehemently to the idea and when I asked her why, the answer came straight from her heart: As a little girl she had lived through the London Blitz where German bombers pounded London and other British cities every night in an attempt to break the morale of the civilian population.

Under the guidance of a new commander of the Russian ‘special operation’ in Ukraine, Herman Goerings’ (German Air Force Commander in WWII) tactic is now being used against civilians in Ukraine with the added aim of destroying energy infrastructure.

This is part of a predicted escalation in the war, similar to what happened in WWII.

The people that are inflicting this suffering on the world are self appointed kleptocrats and their political cohorts like Putin and Zelenski.

New Premier

Alberta will have a new Premier next week, following the thanks giving weekend. After 4 months of campaigning, Danielle Smith won the race to become the new leader of the United conservative Party mostly based on rhetoric against the federal government masterfully mismanaged by Justin Trudeau.

I used to listen to Danielle Smith when she was a radio host for the Chorus radio network here in Alberta, a post she held for many years after bungling her leadership of the Wildrose Party and subsequently losing her seat in the legislature a number of years ago.

She also walked out on her job at the radio station during Covid, when she did not get her way in terms of what people to interview, etc. Nasty social media feedback also discouraged her from continuing in the job.

Premier Smith will now be faced with the task of uniting two fundamentally opposed factions within the UCP: The previous Progressive Conservatives and the former Wild Rose crew. She also has ideas about building railway lines to tidewater ports under the nose of the federal government.

From radio host to Premier, building railways and reforming a fundamentally flawed health care system?

I am waiting for another crash.

Increasing tensions

Just heard on the Norwegian news this morning that Norwegian Army reservists are being deployed to guard Norwegian oil and gas production facilities on, and offshore.

That in response to the explosions in the Baltic that ruptured the Nordstream 1 and 2 gas lines from Russia to Germany some time ago.

The fear is that Russia’s war strategy involves cutting off energy supplies to Europe as winter closes in, potentially igniting civil unrest in European countries.

Expect much more to come as the war ramps up along the same pattern that happened in the early stages of WWII.

Gardening challenges

I have been gardening every year for most of my adult life, in Australia and Canada, and water has always been at the center of action. From filling buckets in Deadman’s Creek on my homestead in North Queensland, Australia, irrigating from rivers for cash crops nearby, and using well and rainwater here in the bush in Central Alberta, Canada.

I have used overhead sprinklers and trickle irrigation, progressing towards less water use without diminishing crop yield.

With drier and hotter weather in my neck of the wood at this time, I am currently moving into the use of wicking grow bags for my garden. That means supplying water to the bottom of plant roots, rather than from the top

The availability of modern, durable and cheap plastics has made this a practical proposition, in my case re-using 25 Kg chicken layer feed bags that soak up water when filled with soil and placed in a shallow bath.

Thus, the amount of water used to grow a tomato, for example, is reduced by an order of magnitude in comparison to trickle irrigation where water is wicked away from the row of vegetables by the adjacent dry soil.

Wherever there is a challenge, there is a solution. That is why we are able to snoop around on the planet Mars without even setting foot on the place.

Conscription in Canada?

As the war in Europe moves into a more serious phase with the announced conscription of 300,000 Russians into the armed forces in that country, one may ask, could that happen here in Canada?

That in light of the fact that the Canadian armed forces are only getting half the number of people required enlisting at this time. And that is without direct engagement in a war.

History shows that Canada implemented conscription in both WWI and WWII, causing major divisions within the country by activating the “War Measures Act”.

Our Prince Justin already used its descendant, the “Emergencies Act”, against his political opponents following the Freedom Convoy this year, freezing the bank accounts of “troublemakers” and could be expected to try the same stunt again.

My guess is that he would have to flee the country if he did. (Just too much ammo out there for comfort.)

Besides, under the present ‘leadership’ and following Covid, Canada would likely break up if a conscription drive was implemented. 

Defending democracy?

The Canadian mainstream, legacy, woke, whatever you want to call them, media are now complaining about the inability of the Canadian armed forces to recruit people to serve as soldiers in the ranks. Reportedly, only half the numbers required are signing up at this time.

Those same reporters seem to forget that they have been instrumental in criticizing and taking down prominent members of the armed forces for misconduct in the sometimes distant past, bringing the culture of the whole enterprise into question.

Add onto that an imperial war in Europe where recruits could easily end up as Putin’s cannon fodder as things escalate out of hand.

As icing on the cake, we have a dysfunctional government in Ottawa busy breaking up Canada, as we know it, while patting themselves on the back as to how good they are.

No wonder people prefer to stay home.

Vulnerable power grid

Our society has many shortcomings, one of which is the power grid where electric power is generated in centralized locations and distributed over vast areas.

For example, I am told that the power station at the Bennett Dam in British Columbia generates some 30+% of power consumed in BC feeding thousands of power nodes and lines to individual consumers.

A large storm like Fiona now hitting eastern Canada brings home the vulnerability of this system as thousands of consumers will be waiting to get power back to run their freezers and charge their vehicles. (Didn’t think of that one, did ya?)

In fact, in our society, “becoming civilized” means getting increasingly vulnerable to external events that you cannot control, be they natural or man made. Time to get back to basics, meaning preserving food like our ancestors did, among other things.

Weather speculation

Here in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Alberta, where I live, two hot and dry summers are now behind us. They stand out from anything I have experienced here in the last 31 years.

I recorded 10 millimeters of rain on August 28 and a few sprinkles over the month of July. We had some good rains in June, giving local farmers reasonable crop yields at this time

Last year, July temperatures held pretty steady around 30 degrees Celsius with a similar pattern in August this year.

Hot and dry. That’s what we in the inland of Turtle Island are experiencing right now. Down stateside they are now in a drought that started some 20 years ago, with no end in sight.

Meanwhile, unprecedented deluges are happening elsewhere in the world, alongside droughts, even in the south of my native Norway where hydropower is getting scarce and expensive for consumers.

What’s next? I think we should expect more of the same and adapt to this new world, as we have done many times in the past and learn to live with less.

Quiet revolution

A kitchen table, the table in a community center or in a cafe may be the place where a new revolution begins. A place where you can interact with another person on many levels without the risk of being demonized by some self appointed ‘experts’ online.

Many meetings over time can create new friendships and cement ideas about where to go next in a struggle against a centralized dictatorial power perpetrated by some very self centered individuals, living in their respective fantasy worlds.

That’s essentially what happened in France, leading up to the French Revolution and the storming of the Bastille on July 14, 1789. We the People have demonstrated time and again, that when push comes to shove, nothing can stop us.

Political wheel

Last night Pierre Poilievre was elected as the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada with a solid majority of 68% of the vote. He also managed to attract a lot of new members to the party, based on his pre-election rhetoric and previous performance on the floor of Canada’s parliament.

He appealed to the sentiments of ordinary Canadians that are sick and tired of Prince Justin’s antics on the world stage and his failure to live up to promises made as Prime Minister of Canada. Add to that a number of scandals involving conflict of interest, meaning that the establishment and the general public have had enough of this man’s poor performance in office.

Poilievre told people what they wanted to hear and received their votes in return. He next task is now to distract them from some of his more ‘extreme’ promises, like firing the Governor of the Bank of Canada who has been accused of gross incompetence by printing money and causing excessive inflation.

But wait a minute, is this new? Or is it a standard approach used by party political hacks, like Poilievre, forever?

My guess is that Poilievre has been picked by the establishment to replace Prince Justin and that he has been groomed to carry out their agenda a long time ago.

Royal passing

I’m writing this piece to record the passing of Queen Elizabeth II of Britain and Canada, Australia and many other nations yesterday, September 8, 2022.

This article will be engraved onto a glass plate by myself shortly and placed in my own private time-vault, along with a lot of other material.
So, a record that could arguably be preserved for several thousand years is thereby created, as part of my “deep time project”.

The institution of “Royalty” is as old as humankind itself and it unites people under an umbrella of common beliefs. Its success of failure depends on the person that carries the crown and Elizabeth was a master of that art/craft resulting in great esteem for her across the world, as evidenced by all the attention paid to her passing.

The future of monarchies in Britain and other places in the world is uncertain at this time, with Elizabeth’s son Charles now being King Charles III. He is 73 years old and has seen his share of controversies as Prince Charles, including a failed marriage and the tragic death of his ex, Diana, Princess of Wales who was very popular on the world stage.

Do we need Royals to look up to and unite us? To me, that depends on the qualities of the individuals that want to wear a crown, not their ancestry.

Comparing pandemics

According to reports, the Covid pandemic has claimed somewhere between 5 and 10 million lives world wide in a population of some 7.9 billion. Estimates for the 1918 flu range between 50 and 100 million deaths in a population of 1.8 billion.

The progression of the 1918 flu was also faster, driven by unrestricted movement of troops on and between continents. The conduct of the Great War was a priority, giving the mutating bugs unrestricted access to the civilian population as well.

Only when things got really bad did authorities react with restrictive measures, by which time the brutal spread and death toll had created a considerable degree of herd immunity.

In contrast, public health measures were taken early on in the Covid pandemic across the world slowing down the progress of the virus and its mutants, giving it more time to change its strategy and become more infective and less lethal, serving its own ends for survival and multiplication, to the point where it is still alive and well in September 2022, but causing little concern in the general population.

In that sense, Covid has been more successful than its 1918 brother by ensuring its place in the human population, as long as hosts are available.

We humans should learn from Covid that destroying our own host, Gaia, our living Earth Mother, does not serve OUR interest. 

Early election in Alberta?

United Conservative Party leadership contender Danielle Smith says that she will introduce an “Alberta Sovereignty Act” in the legislature as soon as she takes over as Premier of Alberta, if she becomes the new leader of the party.

Meanwhile the establishment is sounding all manner of alarm bells in response to her assertions, including present Premier Jason Kenney and many others within the UCP.

Add to that the fact that Danielle Smith does not have a seat in the legislature at this time. So, a sitting MLA will have to step down to trigger a by-election which Danielle Smith would have to win to claim her seat.

Smith is also promising a free vote in the legislature on the proposed legislation, which she could easily lose, based on sentiments expressed by many to date.

Where would that leave her government? Would she call an early election, or try to govern with an unruly party behind her? Like present Premier Kenney did, and paid the price?

The next legislative election in Alberta has to happen before May 29, 2023. My guess is that it will come long before that deadline.

Land and water

Looking back on human history, the competition for land is unceasing, just like it is among all predatory animals, in relation to their own kin.

That results in conflict; wars in the case of us humans because we are socially organized into groups, greatly enhancing our ability to inflict destruction on others and grab more land for ourselves.

In order for a group to remain cohesive, individuals need to share common values and beliefs, so cultures arise to meet that need.

Problem is, other cultures arise, and the values of groups clash. Mix in competition for land and you get a war, as is happening in Ukraine at this time.

Each party rationalizes its position and justifies the war based on its own beliefs and values. Ultimately the stronger and more enduring party prevails, or the conflict may end up in mutual exhaustion/destruction.

Control of land is essential for any individual/group that wants to survive, but so is fresh water. And it is now crystal clear (pun intended) that fresh water resources across the world are disappearing at an alarming rate, as they are not being replenished by violent storms that are also on the increase.

The consequences of this are daunting because it lays the groundwork for more human conflict between “haves“ and “have nots”.

Most people here in North America are taking the availability of fresh water for granted and are only now beginning to understand that they have been living a myth.

There is only one long term solution: Drastically changed living habits.
The alternative is Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD).

Representative democracy

The problem with this system is that the wrong people tend to percolate to the top and make a lot of bad decisions on behalf of us all.

Would you like the pilot of the Boeing 747 that you are about to board to be selected based on his/her hairstyle or ability to make you laugh or cry?

I don’t think so. Yet we do it all the time in regards to the politicians that are entrusted with the reigns of our nations.

“Der Fuhrer”, Adolf Hitler is a very good case in point. He used to be a bum in Vienna in his young days, but showed great courage as a message runner on the Western Front during WWI.

Due to his oratorical skills and political cunning he ended up in charge of the mighty German armed forces and we all know about the disaster for all of us that followed: A corporal fancying himself to be a general.

The list goes on and on with our own Prince Justin here in Canada who used to be an arts teacher before entering politics, helped by the money and power of his late father, Pierre Trudeau’s supporters.

He has bungled the job ever since and created major divisions in Canadian society, mostly due to an inflated ego.

Real leaders have to emerge and prove themselves as they move up into positions of responsibility, rather than being picked at random based on the work of propaganda machines.

That way we don’t get disc jockeys flying airplanes.

Ukraine, now Taiwan

In the lead up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Western leaders simply ignored all manner of warnings from Russia in regards to Ukraine’s application for membership in NATO. A predictable outcome followed.

A similar play is now underway between the Western Empire (US and its allies, including Canada) and China where China is being provoked to respond with force to what is perceived by them to be an incursion into their territory.

It is being done deliberately by powerbrokers within the Western Empire, using geriatric politicians like Joe Biden/Nancy Pelosi as tools with no regard for the rest of us, or our kids and grandkids, who will become the victims of this megalomaniacal madness.

Next step: Russia and China will form an alliance to deal with Western Empire politics, not unlike the axis formed by Germany, Italy and Japan during WWII.

Also bear in mind that China has a lot of internal problems with its Covid response and a collapsing real estate market. An external war could be very convenient for the leadership of that totalitarian state.

Our system is broken, just as was predicted by George Orwell (Eric Blair) in his novel “1984”.

Re-tribalizing

We live in an unstable and dangerous world. The institutions created to serve our needs are becoming increasingly self serving, not unlike the medieval churches, preying on people and amassing property and wealth.

Our latest predators occupy cyber space and carefully monitor our physical and mental habits with a view to exploiting them for their own benefit.

They also try to create communities centred around themselves in cyberspace so that we may further serve their interests, while leaving us friendless and lonely.

It seems that the universe is geared towards predation, at all levels, from the microbial and up.

We have now arrived at a place where real action is needed to defend ourselves and the answer is as old as our species is: Re-establish tested and true ways of surviving by supporting each other physically and mentally for the good of all. In other words: Tribalizing.

The power of this way of living has been amply demonstrated in Afghanistan by the locals that have beaten back three invasions over the last couple of centuries: By the British, the Soviet and the Western Empires in that order.

The corrupt and self serving nature of these institutions make them vulnerable to counter attacks at strategic times and locations, as has been demonstrated time and time again in Afghanistan. The fight may be long and bloody but those with real life values will ultimately prevail.

My Facebook timeline

I’m happy to say that readership is increasing steadily and that feedback is generally positive. That was not the case earlier, especially during the ‘official pandemic’.

The idea of the timeline is to share information that I am interested in with you folks that read and watch what I publish. Because of automation, this does not feel like ‘work’ to me at all.

Facebook has its shortcomings, including the Zuckerberg appointed ‘police’, in whose bad books I currently occupy a spot, but it is also a very convenient medium for sharing information and ideas.

Before retiring in 2011, I used to be a Caroline area reporter for Mountaineer Publishing in Rocky Mountain House for 11 years and was responsible for one page in “The Mountaineer” weekly newspaper with a circulation of about 10 000. That included local news and an opinion column I called “Pen Meets Paper”. I am happy to say that this is one family owned paper that has survived the online publishing revolution.

Now in my 80th year I am essentially doing the same thing online, from a little cabin in my 20 acre wood, except that the whole world is my oyster and I stay tuned to European news every morning by listening to the Norwegian mainstream news for a “heads up” on breaking stories. (Norway is about 8 hours ahead of us here in the western part of Turtle Island)

I don’t pretend to be unbiased. None of us are. But I like to cast my information gathering net as wide as possible in order to get a handle on what is going on.

I have been invited by Facebook to make some money for my efforts, but have not picked up on that idea.

Conflict in Alberta

I happen to live in a place in Canada where conflict is likely to take centre stage in the near future: Alberta, that was the launchpad for the Freedom Convoy that shut down Ottawa for some 3 weeks in February.

Prince Justin and his crew in Ottawa are in the process of launching an environmental armed police force based in Calgary, that is now advertising for applicants for positions.

The leading contender for the Alberta United Conservative Party leadership position, Danielle Smith who will be the next Premier of Alberta if she wins, is on record saying that she will not cooperate with this new agency.

At the same time, the federal government is attempting to greatly expand an environmental protection area in north-west Alberta and likely plans to use its new police force to enforce regulations at the expense of the oil and gas industry.

Many Albertans see this as the thin wedge of a sword to shut down Alberta’s oil and gas industry and generate internal conflict within the province. They see it as a part of a globalist agenda carried out in Canada by Claus Schwab’s mentees; Justin Trudeau and Chrystia Freeland, the latter having connections to the Azov Battalion in Ukraine with its murky past.

Expect a lot more to come.

Hosting a virus

Covid has settled down among us. A stranger on the block some three years ago, it is now a familiar visitor to most. It has also learnt “to behave” for its own long term good. So it no longer kills a bunch of us hosts, like it did in the early stages.

Most people, like myself, experience something like a cold during the period Covid breeds up inside our bodies. Being a host is no longer an extremely traumatic experience for most, so our fear of the virus has subsided.

That’s exactly what Covid needs and wants from us, because that gives it free reign to invade and occupy our bodies. In other words, it has adapted to ensure its own long term survival in the human population. It is a smart virus.

Can that be said of us, in regards to how we treat Gaia, our Earth Mother? Billions of us are crawling all over her, satisfying our own desires at her expense, with little or no regard for the well being of our host.

Are we going to be a smart virus?

Germany vs France

I’m risking my writer’s neck with this piece comparing Germany and France. So be it.

Germany is the economic power house of Europe, no questions asked. Frenchmen tend to be more laid back, enjoy a drink of wine and beat up on their own government when they get pissed off about something (yellow vests come to mind).

The Germans got badly beaten up in wars twice last century, with France on the winning side in both cases. But they pull themselves up by their bootstraps, rebuild industries and commerce, and away they go again.

So what is their problem? They seem to get the thin end of the stick no matter what? Like now when they might be shivering in their homes this winter as Putin threatens to turn off the taps on pipelines to Germany from Russian oil and gas fields.

The German idea was to use Russian gas as an interim measure while they created wind and solar farms and decommissioned their nuclear plants.

The French? They wisely held on to their nuclear power generating plants and even sell electricity to Germany when the sun doesn’t shine or the wind declines to blow in Germany.

So why do these industrious smart people we call “Germans” invariably end up in a puddle, somehow?

I think it is a combination of two things: Tribalism and an attraction to simplistic ideology, like what happened in the 1930ies.

Please don’t shoot the messenger!

Waterloo?

In modern history this word is associated with Napoleon’s final defeat at a village of that name in Walloon Brabant, Belgium in 1815. “Waterloo” means “water” and “sacred forest”.

From my studies online it is becoming obvious that water is the very underpinning of life and that our fresh water is being used at an unprecedented rate as heatwaves are enveloping the globe at this time. Fresh groundwater and surface water levels are constantly sinking both in North America and Europe.

So I decided on a little experiment here in my own back yard: Collecting rainwater from the roofs of my cabins. Thanks to fortuitous timing I collected well in excess of 2000 litres in June during drought breaking rain events and stored the water in numerous drums and other containers. (I also have a good shallow water well but it showed signs of stress during the 2000- 2002 drought with fine sand coming out of the tap).

This year I have also been growing green beans in my garden and tried growing them in containers as well, watering them by hand with collected rainwater.

With future possible water shortages, container gardening is the obvious way to go where I live where each bean plant consumes about one litre of water per day during hot weather while producing delicious green beans.

We all know that fresh water is at the very essence of life, but somehow, here in Alberta, Canada, we have adopted the attitude that oil and gas are more important and use, on average, some 60,000 cubic meters (60 million litres) of fresh water to hydraulically frack ONE oil/gas well. That water is gone forever from the water cycle.

Napoleon, you are in good company!

Second hot summer

During July in 2021 we had tropical heat on the prairies in Western Canada, where I live. +30 degrees Celsius day in and day out for some 5 weeks. And very little rain resulting in bone dry conditions and low crop yields.

This year farmers had better luck with some good rains in June, before things started to dry out. Then along came August with another tropical heat wave that we are in right now. +31 yesterday and the same expected today.

When I first arrived in Canada I was struck with how cool the summers used to feel, after some 21 years spent in Australia. Not any more.

In 1961 I spent 6 months with my family in Baghdad, Iraq where the temperature during summer fluctuated anywhere between +40 and +45 degrees C, making +35 feel ‘cool’ when it happened from time to time.

The locals in the Middle East are well adapted to these conditions in terms of personal habits and clothes worn, for example. They also take a break from about 10am till 4pm every day to get away from the searing heat. Their day starts around 4am.

I am fortunate to live in a little “green paradise” consisting of 20 acres of bushland cooling down air moving through the vegetation. In contrast to what happens in the parking lot of a shopping mall, for example.

I also have an eight foot by 30 inch swimming pool installed in my garden, in which to cool down in the late afternoon.

Problem is, what happens in the years ahead? That methane gas pouring out of the melting permafrost in the arctic around the globe has got me really worried. Once unleashed, as has happened, this process feeds on itself...

"Get Trump!"

That has been the catch cry of the New York ‘progressive’ establishment since he became the 45th President of the US in 2017.

One reason for this frenzy “to get him” is that he is the ‘outsider on the inside’, a part of the New York establishment, but not really. Moreover, during a long period of engagement in the entertainment world, he developed connections to Eastern block countries in Europe.

Prior to 2017 the Trump team managed to tap onto a seething anger amongst common Americans against the Obama led ‘progressives’ that had long forgotten them and their troubles. So they voted for Trump as President.

It was the shock of a lifetime for the New York Deep State establishment that see themselves as the controllers of the Western Empire. Trump’s perceived connections to the Russian Empire were viewed with great suspicion as well and an attempt was made to “get ‘im” during the Russia Gate drama.

Another attempt was made after he was accused of trying to blackmail Ukrainian President Zelensky to obtain information against 2020 presidential election candidate Joe Biden.

That didn’t work because of the support Trump enjoyed from his Republican Party colleagues.

The final attempt, which was successful, came in 2020 when Trump was defeated by Joe Biden and officially removed from office on January 6, 2021.

Trump firmly believes that this election was fraudulently stacked against him and nearly managed to bring The Republic to its knees on January 6 by encouraging supporters to march on the Capitol, which they did in droves.

Trump also has a stated admiration for Russian President Putin which is resented by the Western Empire Deep State establishment and goes a long way to explain their ongoing efforts to take him out of circulation.

That includes the recent FBI raid on his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.

Internet paddocks

“Mooh!” or “Baah!”. Welcome to the internet funny farm where we are the cattle or sheep grazing in Suckerberg’s Meta landscape or on Planet Google.

The big operators have one thing in common: To create fenced grazing paddocks inside our minds and control all the internal and external gates as much as possible.

Big Brother has arrived in all his glory with his carrots and sticks and woe to he or she who tries to defy this self appointed would-be “Master of All”.

Fortunately, the smarter among us are able to dig holes under the fences and generally navigate the system while retaining our independence of it.

It is all about letting the unceasing propaganda stream from main stream and side stream media presstitutes fly over your head and making your own individual system navigation decisions.

Practical survivalism

Some folks are called “preppers” (being prepared). They try to anticipate future calamities and take measures to minimize impacts on themselves, like storing food, water, guns, money, etc. To some it has become a way of life and a form of religion.

On the flip side we have: “The one that’s gonna get’cha will come out of left field with no warning” so why bother?

I think there is reasonable middle ground here: For example, think about just how vulnerable our electricity distribution grid is to any number of problems and how much our modern lifestyle depends on that grid.

So, filling up the freezer with meat and other frozen goodies in anticipation of a ‘rainy day’, or 20, may not make sense. Preserving food in airtight sterile jars is a much preferred option. That’s what we always did before the convenience of freezers won the day.

Growing your own fruit and veggies in a backyard garden has been my hobby and passion for the last 50 years or so, at great advantage to physical/mental well being as well. And seeing them in jars on a shelf gives one a sense of satisfaction.

Living in the country and guns go hand in hand. Guns are simply another useful tool for survival.

I have found chickens to be a valuable part of the picture, providing a steady flow of protein rich eggs for the table and as ingredients in baking.

Our forebears did this for eons of time; we just need to re-establish true and tested habits.

Power of tribalism

Afghanistan should be a lesson for all. The tribal society of that country has successfully withstood the onslaught of several empires: The British, the Soviet and now the Western Empire that pulled out exactly 1 year ago after 20 years of rampant corruption sponsored in return for compliance with ‘Western values’.

How did the Afghans manage to pull it off? I think it had a lot to do with shared traditional values and long deep relationships between individuals and families. How else could they have withstood the onslaught of foreign cultures with virtually unlimited financial and military power?

Many years ago I cottoned on to a remark made by an Afghan patriot when he spoke about his contempt for the attitude of Soviet soldiers occupying his country: “They force their way into our mosques and piss on the floor” he said. I.e. Plenty of motivation to “get rid of the bastards”, which they did to the great detriment of the now extinct Soviet Union.

The Americans and their cohorts, including Canada, went the same way just a year ago, as the Western installed ‘President’ headed for the hills with a pile of dough. Goes to show the power of belief and persistence in the face of state sponsored predation and corruption.

Is it time to turn our backs on a corrupt and manipulative government in Ottawa?

Party political problem

Representative democracy is about people putting their trust in elected representatives when it comes to enacting legislation that affects everybody.

The party-political version of of this system has proven itself to be dysfunctional, to put it mildly, because the people whose interests are represented by the party always turns out to be a small connected minority with financial clout that use politics to further their own interests.

The “inner brass” of an established party is always connected to this group, at the expense of the rest of us. The bulk of our elected representatives, picked over by party insiders to serve the party rather than the people, are generally opportunistic individuals looking for a career for themselves.

So we invariably end up with a disconnect between people and party.
The establishment ‘fix’ to this is to rotate parties in and out of power with new leaders, allowing people to vent against a system stacked against them.

The status-quo continues.

Water shortages

We tend to take the availability of fresh water for granted. Like the air we breathe. Until we have to start looking for it.

That’s increasingly happening across the world at this time. In Europe, the US and soon, here, in Alberta, Canada. Unless we prepare for the predicted outcomes of climate change and local warming.

It seems that atmospheric water vapour is repelled by warm dry air over an arid area and attracted by humid ground conditions like those created by a forest, for example.

Here in Central Alberta, after good rains in June, we are now back into a heat dome predicted to last until the middle to late part of August.
We have had some concentrated hail events with baseball sized hail stones, but they have been fairly isolated, thankfully.

In Europe groundwater levels are falling at an alarming rate, as our water monitoring bureaucrats here in Alberta are sitting on their hands in front of their computers, expecting some undefined others to get their feet wet out in the field doing some actual useful work.

So, we don’t know how much water we have and what underground water trends are. Before, at some point, folks wake up.

It is theorized that a major factor in bringing down the Maya civilization was a lack of water.

UCP woes

Alberta’s ruling United Conservative Party is in big trouble. It was formed following the election win of the New Democratic Party in 2015 leading to four years of conservative detested government by Rachel Notley.

Conservatives from a broad spectrum of beliefs and opinions managed to hold their noses and form a political party, under the leadership of the present Premier Jason Kenney, for the sole purpose of removing the left slanting Notley from power.

During the pandemic, deep rifts developed within the UCP, based on previous differences in outlook by supporters of the two forming parties, the Wild Rose Party and the Progressive Conservative Party that had been in power for some 40 years prior to 2015.

A former leader of the Wild Rose Party, Danielle Smith, is now the front runner in a UCP leadership contest to replace Kenney as Premier of the province and has promised to bring in an “Alberta Sovereignty Act” as soon as she is proclaimed Premier.

This would empower the Alberta Legislature to say “nay” to federal legislation imposing Ottawa’s will on the province, in the same way that Quebec reacts to federal interventions in its affairs.

An attempt to enact this legislation could easily cause a split within the UCP, along former PC/ Wild Rose party lines and if passed it could be declared “ultra vires”(acting or done beyond one's legal power or authority) by Alberta’s Lieutenant Governor.

That happened to legislation introduced by Alberta’s Social Credit government in the 1930ies when the powers that be didn’t like what they saw.

Alberta mindset

The political landscape in Alberta is changing towards a more independent stance against the edicts of a self serving federal government in Ottawa.

More and more Albertans feel that their constitutional rights are being trampled on by federally elected politicians, as they watched Quebec refusing to support the Emergencies Act measures when it was proclaimed by the federal government back in the spring.

Those measures froze the bank accounts of some Canadians at the whim of Prince Justin’s Minister of Finance Chrystia Freeland and caused a bank run as people hurried to move their money into safe places.

The (not so) United Conservative Party of Alberta leadership contender Danielle Smith is tapping into this emerging public sentiment and she is the leading candidate in the race to become Alberta’s next Premier shortly.

As Prince Justin and his crew keep on alienating people in Western Canada by pandering to the preconceived notions of their political base, cracks are widening in the Canadian federation.

While Canada and the US are different in many ways, the change in public mindsets is very similar.

Collectivism vs individualism

“We” vs “I” ideas have shaped many societies and generated much conflict in times past, and in the present.

European settlement of Turtle Island was largely guided by individual enterprise, sometimes sponsored by a state: “Between 1519 and 1521 Hernán Cortés and a small band of men brought down the Aztec empire in Mexico, and between 1532 and 1533 Francisco Pizarro and his followers toppled the Inca empire in Peru.”

One kind of collectivist state emerged from the Russian revolution in 1917 under the iron hand of Vladimir Lenin, and later Joseph Stalin (“man of steel”) where all means of production were directly controlled and run by the state.

Another form of collectivism emerged in Germany in 1933 under the hand of Adolf Hitler who proclaimed himself a dictator. Here the means of production was left in the private hands of regime supporters like Krupp Steel, for example.

Be they individualist or collectivist regimes, one characteristic permeates them all: A small group of colluding self appointed dudes, male, female or shemale/hemale holds the reigns of power using a base of ideologically programmed underlings to do their dirty work in return for some privileges and limited delegated power (‘elected’ politicians).

That is true for China, Russia and the Western Empire with its main power node in New York at this time.

Another thing these entities have in common is an ongoing brainwashing process imposed on their populations.

War as 'safety' valve

How do the rulers of a society with multiple internal stresses keep themselves in power? Groups of people with opposing views may face each other in the street, resulting in much destruction.

During the nineteen thirties, a broken financial system led to much suffering and conflict right across the world and spawned extremist views both on the right and left side of the political spectrum. Young unemployed ‘bucks’ with no money were hanging out on street corners, looking for trouble.

It was very convenient to have WWII break out in 1939, effectively mopping up all these ‘troublesome elements’, put them in uniform and send them off to war.

Some 1300 years ago there was a surplus of young bucks in what is now my old homeland Norway and a ‘solution’ was designed by the establishment of the day by equipping groups of them with ships, weapons and provisions and send them off to raid distant shores.

The expectation was for them to bring back wealth in many forms, including slaves. They are now known as “the Vikings”.

The crusades about 1000 years ago were used for the same purpose.

In our day, when the Western Empire is rattling sabres against Putin and Xi Jinping, one can ask whether the war option is on the table to save the political butts of the present establishment?

German saga

The two great wars of the 20th century, known as WWI and WWII, are now part of the fabric of Western history. It can legitimately be argued that it was really one long war, with a pause in the middle.

It was a struggle between empires leading to the demise of some and the rise of others. A shift in the global balance of power.

I have spent a lot of time trying to understand the rise of National Socialism in Germany in the 1920ies and thirties: Following the cessation of hostilities in 1918, Germans literally had their noses rubbed in the dirt by the other side (France, England and the US).

The government of the German Weimar Republic caused hyper inflation prior to 1922/3 allowing the rest of the world’s predators to literally rape Germans who were made destitute by having worthless money.

This is when National Socialism began to grow in Germany, in reaction to what was seen as a government of traitors.

The Great Depression that began in 1929 finished the job and Adolph Hitler was able to get sufficient support to make himself dictator of the nation from 1933 and onwards.

Based on the circumstances of the time, I can fully understand why 98% of the German population supported Hitler at the peak of his popularity, based on what had happened to them before.