I am Scott in Montreal. I grabbed scottinmontreal.ca last year, but I haven't done anything with it yet but sit on it...
I posted online with that tagline for the first time ever in 1995 on deanforamerica.com (thinking, if I am going to weigh-in anonymously on a US politician's "blog" then there needs to be at least a bit of info on who I am, for people to know where I'm coming from). From there, I found dailykos.com and became one of its first 600 account holders, occasionally posting on my own page there, as they so graciously offer all users.
Soon I found out I could use blogger.com for my rantings and the lovely progressivebloggers.ca soon saw fit to kindly forward my posts to its readership as well, providing my minute drops of influence into the worldwide web.
"What is an ocean, but a multitude of drops?" --David Mitchell, (Cloud Atlas, 2004)
[Drip]
My partner of now 14+ years has a tremendously high opinion of my opinions on politics and policy, it seems. She believes fiercely in me (thank you my love), and is determined that I hammer out something today; something momentous in its effect on our future (Our family's? Our country's?)
I believe in her too, so this is an effort at that.
I know it's important to know what I don't know, which is an awful, awful lot. I opine a great deal on Bluesky (reactively for the most part). When the mood strikes, or I think I see something clearly that maybe needs more than a mere post on social media for me to wrap my thoughts around, I come here, and I write it out. Nowadays, with LLMs creating readable prose thoughtlessly, I know that my way isn't so fashionable, but I never know what conclusions might come to me until I start hammering out my thoughts; and to mix a metaphor, all I know in my world is nails. Songwriting works that way too oftentimes. The guitar or mandolin know better what my clumsy fingers are trying to accomplish much of the time than I do. But creativity and thinking (for me) only come through the doing.
I write, therefore I think. Therefore I am not keen on giving it all up to AI.
But before that, I try to soak up what I can gather from what the smart people put out there: people like Gerald Butts, Chantal Hébert, the two Dyers (Gwynne and his son, Evan), Juan Cole, Billy Bragg, Michael E. Mann, Mark Chadbourn, Tom Engelhart, David Rothkopf, Seth Abramson, and the queen of understanding who coined the perfect term "international crime syndicate masquarading as a government," Sarah Kendzior (so sorry for your loss; your father sure raised a smart and talented writer).
Closer to home, we follow smarties like Toula Drimonis, Rachel Gilmore, Nora Loreto, Chris Curtis and Stéphane Giroux. Internationally, I will never get over the loss of Billmon.org, who taught me so, so much duing the GWB years.
All that to say, I am a part-timer and not in their league, but I do take a leaf from the above-mentioned Seth Abramson, an author of many distinguished books, who calls what he does "curative journalism" (something my journalism profs of the 80s couldn't have imagined of, in the pre-internet era).
But between that and my rather scattershot lived experiences in the workplace over 40 years (mostly at Canadian branches of American firms, and always in the Montreal area), a lot of stuff has come to my attention.
Let's start with this: The rule of law is paramount and the law should be crafted with care by legislators who are truly accountable to the general public, preferably through democratic means. I believe international law is fundamental but the fact we are in a world of sovereign nation-states makes that very difficult to enforce. When Carney mentioned in his well-received Davos speech that things are shifting with hegemons trying to diminish the concept of international law, it didn't just come out of nowhere.
I am old enough to recall Colin Powell bullshitting the UNSC with a straight face about the need to go into Iraq, which made keeping his boss out of the Hague an even bigger reason for US administration of GWB to decline to even try to ratify the Rome statute that created the ICC in 2002 (even though they'd already stated as much a few months prior, probably while planning the whole phony WMD malarkey they invented to justify their invasion).
But I live in a country that is NOT anybody's 51st state (at least, not yet); a country which DID sign and ratify the Rome Stature, putting it into force on Canada Day of 2002, under then Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, at a time we were fighting alongside the United States and others comprising the ISAF, shedding Canadian blood for American-led futility, it would turn out - a new twist on Je me souviens for this Quebecer.
Speaking of my home province, we have a provincial election coming up and that will coincide with Albertans answering a bunch of stupid referendum questions they shouldn't even be asked in the first place. (There we go with that Rule of Law thing again - the premier is hoping populism will side with her and turn on the independence of the courts. I pray she is thoroughly rebuffed by the majority of good and thoughtful Albertans that know better. I mean, come on, how stupid would it be to even think it's a good idea for a land-locked area to make bitter enemies of the only neighbouring states that could bring their main export to tidewater! Er, unless the whole shebang is to try to make Alberta, or some rump thereof, a new US territory. Don't fall for it, eh!)
Of course who am I to tell them what's what? As a Quebecer, I cannot point to a single time in my political awareness that we have been served with anything better than marginally-not-horrible leadership in Quebec City. One government after another has been either corrupt, wilfully blind, condescending or terribly incompetent (the CAQastrophe managed to tick off all the above boxes, incredibly).
On the left-right spectrum, the high-minded and open-minded Québec-Solidaire is the most clear-headed - until one notices they think separating from Canada is such a good idea, they'll take their election to power as a mandate for it all on its own - at least, that was in their platform last time around. While the current co-spokesperson, Ruba Ghazal is a bright and capable communicator (just read her touchingly personal book, Les Gens du Pays viennent aussi d'ailleurs), her party is not going to gain enough traction to be anything more that a spoiler, NDP-style.
The Parti-Québécois is leading in the polls, but its leader, Pierre St-Paul Plamondon, is churlish and he will get decimated in the debates (which will greatly matter). If the Liberal Party and its new leader Charles Milliard play their cards right, they will win, as there is nothing the CAQ's new leader Christine Frechette can do to erase all the mountains of shitty governance she and her party have on their record over two terms. Too early to tell, but I suspect the Conservative party might get some spill-off votes from the CAQ, leaving the PLQ to come up the middle in a ton of ridings where votes will be split, or voters stay home in disgust.
But whichever party forms government, I do hope they have the good sense to put smart people in positions of power who can salvage some of the good things we have, including renewable electricity. My recipe: invest in schools, teach the kids more than just the History of Every Bad Thing Someone With an English Name Did to Insult or Punch Down on les québécois, relax the parts of the language and "laicité" laws that discriminate against religious and language rights and just use a ton more carrot and less stick generally in that regard. Embrace our indigenous peoples and show them and indeed all non-white, non-francophone Quebecers a little love and understanding. Own up to the systemic racism that has come from the over-zealous application of maitres-chez-nous that has given white francophones a level of privilege they don't even realize, while all their garbagemen and low-wage workers can't break out into the workforce because of the language/culture barrier that now keep them down (what an astounding reversal since the 1970s!)
Because everyone now is aware of how the gameboard was tilted unfavourably against the French for generations, and how important it is to support the French fact of Quebec. In fact, it is a huge part of our shield against the hegemons - especially the one just a few minutes south of us.
I want all my fellow Canadians to understand the importance of our linguistic and cultural duality, French and English, in shielding us from the forces that wish to create a phony Americanized monolithic culture. If you don't know French, consider learning it. Consider trying. Consider the amazing cultural richness you are denying yourself from gaining a greater understanding of your country. When O Canada is sung entirely in English, a part of me feels gyped, especially considering it was an artifact of French Canada in the first place! French Quebec was the original Canada. The rest of the provinces hopped on board and brought more into it (so much more!) Oh, but there's my colonist bias. Quebec itself was an Algonquin term originally, which is why its first e only takes the accent aigue when expressed in French.
So here is what all of Canada should do (hope Carney's listening). Get our butts onto the solar power highway and as fast as we can. Even in the Trump era, where windmills are being thrown overboard in favour of more coal and oil and gas, an American company called Factorial Energy is making headway in developing solid-state batteries that could make electric cars much quicker to charge, much less trouble in winter, and basically, bring us up to the speed the Chinese are already at. Yes there are other renewables, but solar is the deal breaker that we need to push hard on, or we'll be left out in the cold.
Okay, that's all the world's problems I have the energy to solve just now. I hope some will comment and tell me where and how I am totally wrong, or whatever drops you may wish to contribute.
Thank you. Be good to one another (and that goes for all of you).
- 30 -
