Copy - Letter to the Editor - St. John's Telegram
The following letter was written and sent to the Telegram in response to an article on Friday by Brian Jones. It never ceases to amaze me that the tripe presented in Jones article is still being foisted on the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. Not surprising I suppose when you consider that the paper is owned by a Quebec media company.
Here is the letter.
To the Editor,
In his Friday, April 3rd article, "Anti-anniversary antics", Brian Jones attempted to drive home the point that by not spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a celebration marking 60 years of Confederation this Province is committing an "offense" against Canada.
Mr. Jones stated that even though we may have a "stack of complaints" with Canada we fail to understand that those complaints are with the government, not the "innocent bystanders", the people of Canada, who have been insulted as a result of our "obnoxious offense".
I believe it is Mr. Jones who fails to understand the situation.
Our fight is indeed with the government of Canada but that government is not an independent entity which mysteriously appeared out of thin air. Governments are elected by the people of a Country and are kept in power by those same "innocent bystanders" who Jones seems so worried about.
Jones contends that the Provincial government decision not to mark the anniversary indicates a misguided position by the citizens of the Province yet somehow also contends that any actions taken over the years by the Federal government do not reflect on the position of the citizens of Canada.
I hope the people of Canada truly are embarrassed by the silence marking 60 years and I hope that silence makes every Canadian look to discover why so many Newfoundlanders and Labradorians could care less about celebrating 60 years in Confederation. I'm sure their investigation will, as it should, lead them to an even greater embarrassment than Jones claims was perpetrated on them by the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.
Myles Higgins
11 comments:
Several issues identified here.
First we have no media representing our issues, concerns, views, and disputes with and or against central canada's majority population.
Second while Jones may have blamed the people vis a vis who elected the current government. (In this case overwhelmingly for doing the same thing they have been doing no more give aways ETC)
He omits to blame the majority of the canadian people population who elected and continue to elect national parties who continue to us, abuse, and generally NL's issues and concerns because we are such a small portion of the electorate.
But at the same time the good people of NL are even more to blame for electing people to these same national political parties who through no fault of their own must cater too and generally steal from a minority poll itical province like ours to appease the majority provinces so as to either win power or remain in power.
But they too can be forgiven because up until the last federal election they really didn't have a choice.
You see it isn't the poll itical parties we need to change it is the Poll itical system!
Because all of the national Poll itical parties have to work within the same poll itical system and that means they all have to try and win the 181 seats out of a possible 308 that exist in Upper/Lower canada if they want to have any chance of winning an election.
We might all be equal canadians on an individual basis but when you consider the federal parties and govt in this federation deal with the provinces and since the provinces are in no way shape or form equal then the people who live in those minority provinces are in no way shape or form equal.
(Exception Quebec and Ontario have equality in the Senate and the Supreme court of Kanukistan)
Stop running around putting out fires when the root cause of the blaze is our systemically flawed political system and lack of equality anywhere in our federation.
Equality or Exit!
Separation if necessary not necessarily secession.
8 Provincially appointed, Bilingual Senators from each province.
To represent the morals values issues concerns and disputes within the federation.
By having them appointed they won't be challenging the higher power of the elected HOC.
By allowing the provinces to appoint them they won't be beholding to the poll itical parties but rather to the provinces who interests they were originally supposed to represent.
By making bilingualism a prerequisite it removes any objection the province of Quebec might have (QUEBECOIS doesn't mean the province of quebec it means for all intensive purposes French speaking canadians)
Problem is no national PROXY party of the Upper/English Lower/French canadian majority will ever get a majority if it adopts this as a policy because these two provinces don't want the status Quo to change because it works for them even though it is in fact restricting our federation from becoming all that it can be.
Hence the catch 22 of our political system and the false sense of democracy we have in our
Hope Springs eternal in a democracy unfortunately for a minority province like ours it is eternally hopeless.
Voting for any of the national PROXY parties of the Upper/Lower canada majority is hopeless.
People of Canada embarrassed? I think not. Do you hear anything in the media from the rest of Canada? No? Guess what, nobody in the rest of Canada could care less that it's the 60th anniversary of NL's joining confederation. I've said it before and I'll say it again, we're on our own. Nobody in the rest of Canada could care less about NL. Really folks we are really on our own and the sooner we realize that the better off we'll be. As for Brian Jones, he's clearly a douche bag shill for the Quebec interests. They own the paper, they'll get their message out. It's as simple as that. What he says may offend us but in reality the rest of Canada really don't give a rats ass about anything going on that far east.
Myles: I read you blog this morning and learned of Brian Jones' column. I hadn't read The Telegram up to that point.
I posted two commentaries to his site and I have pasted them below.
I think they are generic enough that either of them would be out of place for your site.
Sick of the way that we have been treated! from NL writes:
Why would we celebrate the 60th anniversary of a country which has kept us oppressed?
Do you not remember Mr. Jones how Ottawa has stripped our Atlantic Accord of all the revenue which was supposed to come to our province. The provisions in the Atlantic Accord were agreed to by Ottawa to give the province of Newfoundland and Labrador a fairer deal from its Oil resource revenue.
The last 2 Federal Budgets stripped away all that revenue, approximately $2 Billion dollars, and caused havoc in our provincial budgets and put a great deal of strain on our deficit position?
Have you not noticed sir, the way that Ottawa has allowed our 'fish quota' resource, which we put under Ottawa's stewardship in 1949 to be maintained for future generations, to be whittled away through cronyism and distribution to foreign countries to garner international trade?
I wonder what your newspaper's position is on the shrimp quotas which Federal Fisheries Minister Shea just handed out to here provine PEI, a province with neither harvesting nor processing capability of that resource? It is pure cronyism and an illegal use of that resource we put under Ottawa's control.
It goes on and on, the questions that I can ask you on the province of Newfoundland and Labrador's natural resource base, which didn't create industry, jobs and thus economy in our province, but, instead, those raw natural resources found their way to the other provinces of Canada to create vibrant economies.
For instance the coveted Upper Churchill Hydroelectric Energy which made Quebec the beneficiary to the tune of $2 Billion annually, Oil which is refined in Halifax, N.S. and Saint John, N. B and Minerals such as the Nickel Ore maintaining 2 smelters in Sudbury, Ontario and Thompson, Manitoba?
All of the resources mentioned above COULD NOT be smelted or refined anywhere unless Ottawa had its say into it. After all you cannot put up a ore smelter or an oil refinery without Ottawa's say.
If you added up what the resources are worth to the economies that the resources have created in the other provinces, it would amount to BILLIONS and BILLIONS of dollars annually.
As a result of these resources not creating the economy in Newfoundland and Labrador that we deserved, we have had to take so much criticism from Canadians on the E.I. and the equalization program.
These program operated here by design, simply because Ottawa saw to it that the economies from our natural resource base would operate elsewhere and our province and its people would take the scorn from having to wear the have not province status of being economy-less.
It makes me sick what happened to my province, Newfoundland and Labrador, a place with so many great natural resources and a location which is as strategic as any in the world to operate industy.
Really, Mr. Jones what is there to celebrate?
Second commentary below:
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Sick of the way that we have been treated! from NL writes:
The first thing I want to set straight is that I am not a separatist, now that we have been part of Canada for 60 years, but what I do want is a better Economic Arrangement with Canada. I am not asking for anything from the other provinces, I am asking that our natural resources be utilized to create an economy here no different that the type of economy which they have created for the other provinces of Canada, and the economy that we should have been blessed with for 60 years.
I am asking everyone to put on their simple accounting hat for a moment.
We have been carrying an accumulated debt of $12 Billion dollars in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador for many years, for years all we did was pay the interest with not being applied to the principal, despite all the ammunition in resources which were not being used for our advantage.
Now if we would do a little simple accounting on the natural resources which were and are still exported out of this province, we will find that probably annually those same resources generate directly and indirectly that same amount of revenue as our accummulated debt, to the beneficiary provinces and in some case foreign countries which have gotten to generate industries and thus economies from our resource base.
1. Upper Churchill Hydroelectric generates $2 Billion for Quebec Hydro, that is 95% of the revenue with 5% coming to the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, scheduled to get lesser for Newfoundland and Labrador in 2016. Also Quebec gets to keep the Kyoto credits which are generated from that cleaner energy. It is also purported that Quebec doesn't report the $2 Billion figure in its revenue to the Federal Government, which gives it a better share of the equalization pot.
2. Fish resource, the quotas of which we passed over to Ottawa in 1949 for protection. Ottawa utilizes those quotas to generate International Trade, and pay for some of the cronyism which goes on in the country, very little of the revenue which the province of Newfoundland and Labrador has been party to. We can safely say that given the trade it generates there has to be Billions of dollars generated there.
3. Oil - Ottawa has made $10 Billion or more on its 8.9% equity in our offshore Oil field. The clean oil is refined in Halifax, Nova Scotia and Saint John, New Brunswick refineries, both of which, no doubt, have made a tidy sum directly and indirectly, as a result of holding the right to refine all of that Oil secured under the Atlantic Accord. I also feel free to say that no doubt it has been in the Billions of dollars range. I can not put a figure on it, but we know the value of Oil over the past number of years and the revenue it generates.
4. We have been shipping off Iron Ore to Central Canada from Labrador for the Manufacturing Industry there, that resource, no doubt, has generated Billions of dollars for the Auto and other areas of manufacturing which have utilized that ore to create industries and thus economies.
5. The Nickel ore was sent off to Sudbury, Ontario and Thompson, Manitoba for smelting and it has created direct and indirect economies in those two town for years.
6. Then there is the Airspace which NavCanada gets to collect the rent from, which has amounted to quite a few dollars over the past 60 years.
7. If the province of Newfoundalnd and Labrador had not been part of Canada, but instead a separate Nation those resources would been put to work for our country, all the industry and employed people would be paying their taxes to the country of Newfoundland and Labrador instead of Ottawa, and therefore that revenue would have been at the discretion of the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador and we would not have to wait for a few dollars to be thrown to us at Ottawa's whim. We all know what Ottawa does to any dollars accrued to Newfoundland and Labrador, just think Atlantic Accord.
These are just some of the resources which have gone out of here, I know that I haven't accounted for all them, but I have collected those few to give Newfoundlanders and Labradorians some idea of what those resources could have meant in the way of creating a vibrant economy right here in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, had we not gone with Canada in 1949.
We do know that the world was on the cusp of an Economic Revolution in 194.
Presently there is a collection of twenty well-developed countries known as the G20, of which Canada, I do believe, is the # 8 in that group, that all evolved their economies greatly since that time.
During the Second World War the province of Newfoundland and Labrador was thought of very strategically by the allies. The US had 4 Military bases operating in the province, the British were here and so were the Canadians.
I am sure had we not become a province of Canada, a country which dreamt of our land for 80 years at that point, the United States would have guided us into growing a vibrant economy, without demanding that we become part of their country, of course they would have done trade with us as payment.
Germany and Japan were both obliterated during the Second World War and the United States instituted the $6 Billion Marshall Plan which raised both of these countries out of the dust bin into becoming two of the great G8 Nations, the group, which have grown and is now known as the G20 group of countries.
But I am pretty sure we didn't have any say into our economic and political destiny, England and Canada had that all wrapped up in a neat little package before we even knew what was transpiring around us.
Patriot I was brought to task for my commentary in The Telegram by another commentator who thought some of the blame should be placed on....... My repy is pasted below:
Sick of the way that we have been treated! from NL writes: Justin Case from Shanghai writes: Sick o... says: But I am pretty sure we didn't have any say into our economic and political destiny...
So, what you're really saying is that NL never ever really had any decent leadership... or free will.........????????
You are correct!
Justin, I omitted saying that by oversight, but that is a big part of it, AND STILL TODAY we have 7 Federal MPs in Ottawa, who are more knowledgable on what has gone on before and they know their electorate is well aware of that which has caused a great deficit in our province, when compared with the other nine, but yet they toe the party line on every issue and they overlook their own province's needs.
Our 7 MPs are expected to do what is good for Ottawa and Central Canada.
The Federal Leader of the Liberal, Conservative and NDP parties expect that service of them, but ultimately it is up to the 7 Federal MPs to throw off the yoke of the Federal Government and say we weren't voted in by you, we were voted in by the Newfoundland and Labrador electorate to do what it right for them, and our province.
Had the other Newfoundland and Labrador MPs done that in the past, we would have seen, I am sure more of our natural resource base working for us.
Thanks Jason for pointing out the omission because I am sure we can place a great deal of the blame on the Federal politicians whom we elected and who had severe cases of the 'me syndrome'.
They were looking out for number 1. themselves and to hell with the rest of us.
I hope the 7 MPs who are in Ottawa read this commentary and take note, because we are not about to put up with any more of their shenninigans and their behaviours of the past.
They were voted in by us to look after our province's needs and that is what we will demand them to do.
They have to Stop the corruption of expecting to be looked after by the Political Patronage System which was put in place as payment for them toeing the line for Ottawa!
Political Patronage must become redundant!
OK, so what. I haven’t heard one major Canadians newspaper say anything in regards to Canadians or Canada for that matter, being disappointed that Newfoundland and Labrador did not throw a big Happy Sixty years in Confederation Party.
Now let’s be honest with each other .Happy Confederation. What do we have to be so happy about? Oh yes, Canada gave us welfare, UIC, and old age security. Who is fooling who here? Do you honestly think that Newfoundlanders would not have had those things sorted out for themselves if we had to take back our independence from Britain? Damb right we would have. Another thing that still boggles my mind is that Canada thinks that we would not have been able to get the resources in place to provide such services to our citizens. Of course we would have because the western Allies at the end of the war would have had to let us in their economy at the end of the war not only for the contributions that we had made to the war effort but because of our geographical location. Any Nato allie could have been attacked from Newfoundland if we had to turn to the Soviets for example, like Cuba.
But this is not the point that I wish to make here today. Why should we be happy about our supposed choice? We have lost the greatest natural resource in the world, the north Atlantic Cod fishery. We have been swindled out of the greatest Hydro electric facility on the North American contentant, and now we are having our Oil deposits depleted by Canada.
I know you are from St Johns Patriot, but can you remember when all the kids could go down on the Warf when the trap boats came in. And, all the youngsters would gather around trying to jockey for best spot in order to get the most Cod tongues from the fish buckets. I remember how my older brother would always grab the biggest fish, and pick it up by its gills. Then next you know you would have the fish smacked across your face in order to make room.
I’m sick and tired of Canada, Canadians, and their Government smacking my home around in order to make space for Canada. I think Danny Williams is not perfect, but at least he stands up to the bigger older boys around the fish tub that I call Confederation. And, ya wanna know something. He’s not afraid to to give a few smacks back either.
“Republic Of”
To Ussr,
I agree Ussr and I do remember those things you mention but one correction. I'm not from St. John's, in fact nowhere near the Avalon. I'm what a most townies would call a bayman.
Cheers,
M
" Yes B'ye G'wan " :)
OH ,.............and just to let you know my two cents on that inquiry on the fishery, randy is full of S#@%,........I think he should know that canada sold our fishery ,....silly sod.
I think Danny Williams is not perfect, but at least he stands up to the bigger older boys around the fish tub that I call Confederation. And, ya wanna know something. He’s not afraid to to give a few smacks back either.
Indeed, he's not.
And sometimes His "smacks" aren't even against His own people.
But that's getting rarer these days, what with calling his concitoyens traitors, and saying so and so should be shot, etc.
"and so should be shot, etc."
Patriot ,really. Condoning violience from any person or allowing that person to speak of violience like this is very unbecoming of this Blog.
I think that Mr .J. Smallwood was a traitor to his people, but you don't hear me shouting that he should have been dragged out in the town square and be-headed like a dirty dog do you Wally.
A very poor choice of words on your part Wally. I thought that you were educated.
"Im tink'in differant now my, Son !!!"
" Republic Of"
Hey Patriot you must be doing something right. That's twice I've seen WJM post. He must be getting pressure from his mainland handler's to start discrediting where he can. Gotta start working for da money. But enough of that anti Newfoundland shill.
I agree with everything being posted here, excluding WJM, and as I said in my earlier post we are not on Canada's radar. We will always be seen as the province that somehow sucked it's way into Canada to drain it of EI and welfare payments. People really do not have any kind of affection or respect for us. Other than the people who think we are nice quaint folk and see us as harmless simpletons. Thanks largely in part to people like WJM and the other paid "assassins" that regularly attempt to "murder" the Newfoundland character. WJM, Jones and the rest of these traitors would best serve us by taking a long walk off a short wharf.
I think Williams could be getting himself into a no win situation by waying into the fisheries debacle.
First of all most NL'ians can't differentiate the prov responsibilities from the federal responsibilities and by weighing in on the federal responsibilities he is only further solidifying what most incorrectly already assume.
The way I've come to look at any dealings with the national governing party or opposition party in Ottawa is by keeping in mind the Serenity Prayer.
The Serenity Prayer
Path
God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
Forever in the next.
Amen.
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