Reflections on an Election in Gabon

Today voters in the Central African country of Gabon will go to the polls to elect a successor to President El-Hadj Omar Bongo Ondimba, who died in May at the age of 73.

It is the first time in more than four decades that Omar Bongo will not be on the ballot -- though his son, 50-year-old Ali-Ben Bongo, is seeking the presidency himself, along with 22 other candidates.

The elder Bongo became president in 1967 upon the death of Leon Mba, Gabon's first post-independence head of state. At the time, Gabon's constitution provided for the succession of the presidency through the vice president and Bongo happened to have recently been elevated to the that office, after serving for a decade in a variety of bureaucratic positions. The Gabonese constitution now calls for a special election to fill the vacancy caused by the death or resignation of a president.

In his 42 years in office, Bongo presided over a remarkably stable country, by African standards. It is one of the few sub-Saharan countries that never had a violent change of government, and political unrest was rare in the Bongo years.

Bongo ruled, sometimes harshly, and, for the first 20 years or so, through a one-party state apparatus. When democratic changes began sweeping through Africa in the early 1990s (not coincidentally, following the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of Washington-Moscow machinations in Africa), Bongo saw the writing on the wall and oversaw the transition to a multi-party state.

A canny politician, Bongo understood well the adage, "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." He co-opted opposition politicians by giving them cabinet positions and other perks. It's no accident that Gabon is said to have more cabinet officials per capita than any other country in the world. The CIA publication, World Leaders, lists 36 cabinet positions, including four deputy prime ministers and a "Min. of Social Affairs, National Solidarity, & the Protection of Widows & Orphans, in Charge of the Fights Against AIDS." The country's population is 1,514,993 -- you do the math.

In 1998, I was in Gabon during the presidential election and had the opportunity to interview two of the international election monitors who observed the process. The Metro Herald of Alexandria published my interview on March 19, 1999, and here it is:

REFLECTIONS ON AN ELECTION IN GABON

Richard Sincere
Exclusive to The Metro Herald

Last December The Metro Herald’s Richard Sincere went to Gabon, in. Central Africa, to observe that country’s second democratically-conducted presidential election since its new constitution took effect in 1991. In 1993, the incumbent president, El-Hadj Omar Bongo, won reelection with 51 percent of the vote against a field of 11 challengers. In 1998, Bongo was again reelected, this time with nearly 67 percent of the vote in a field of eight candidates.

According to GERDDES-Afrique, an international organization that works for the advancement of democracy in a Africa, “GERDDES-Afrique was pleased to coordinate election observation in Gabon by an experienced group of international monitors from Africa, Europe, and North America. Over 170 observers arrived in the days before the election to see for themselves the functioning of Gabon’s democracy. To this end, they attended campaign rallies sponsored by all the candidates; they spoke with members of the government and with officials of opposition parties; they were briefed by their own countries’ ambassadors stationed in Gabon; they visited polling places, monitored the news media, and listened to the concerns of voters.

“Monitors came to Gabon from West, Central, and Southern Africa and from as far away as Canada, Great Britain, and the United States. Observers included ambassadors and other diplomats, jurists, former heads of state, professors of law and political science, business executives, journalists, and political party officials.”

After some time to reflect on the election process, The Metro Herald (TMH) was able to talk to two of the international observers, Canada’s Troy Lanigan and Julian West. They were half of a a team that also included University of Sherbrooke Professor Charlotte Lemieux and former British Columbia legislator Nick Loenen. Following are their responses to The Metro Herald’s questions.

* * *

TMH: Please briefly describe yourself (place of residence, political affiliation, profession, relevant experience).

Lanigan: My background is in political advocacy. I have a degree in political science and economics, have traveled extensively throughout Europe and the former Soviet Bloc. I’ve worked professionally on campaigns and for various organizations in both Canada and the United States for the better part of 12 years. Currently, I reside in Victoria. British Columbia, and am employed full-time by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation by serving as National Communications Director and a spokesman in British Columbia. I also chair the Electoral Change Coalition of British Columbia (ECCO-BC), a multipartisan group of parties, groups, and individuals dedicated to changing the province’s first-past-the-post voting system through a referendum.

West: I live in Ladysmith, British Columbia (on Vancouver Island), where I am organizing chair and Elections BC delegate, Green Party of British Columbia, and Elections Canada delegate, Green Party of Canada. Professionally, I am a mathematician (Ph.D., MIT 1990), and since 1995 instructor at Malaspina University-College in Nanaimo, BC, and adjunct professor at the University of Victoria. In addition, I am a founding director of ECCO-BC and author of several documents on electoral reform.

TMH: What were your expectations before arriving in Gabon?

Lanigan: To tell you the truth, I really had no idea . . . Gabon would be hot/humid with a lot of black people speaking French in relatively poor conditions . . . that our job as observers was serious and that we would be trained and prepared to do a job.

West: From the limited information I was able to uncover about the country before the trip, I had the impression that it was sufficiently well-off to qualify as a “middle-income” country, virtually the only one in the whole of Africa which was not classified as “poor.” Perhaps naively, I assumed that this implied a certain level of social and political development as well, particularly having read about “relatively free” elections held there in the 1990s. (I’m not unaware that there were until recently a significant number of socialist countries classified as middle-income or higher—but these days I sort of assume that economic development and political development go hand-in-hand.)

TMH: Were these expectations accurate? if not, why not? (Feel free to elaborate.)

Lanigan: As far as Gabon went, our day trip to Lamberene [where Dr. Albert Schweitzer lived and worked] was the highlight … as far as the “observer” business went I had no idea how unorganized everything would be and even when something was half organized it was all [conducted] in French. If not for the books and manuals [we had received in advance], we would have had absolutely no background or grounding prior to the election.

Having said that, I’m glad we learned quickly to ignore scheduled meetings and took the opportunity to meet various campaign workers, attend rallies, and the like. Those encounters we interesting and valuable.

I should add that we got to see and do everything we imagined possible and that did exceed my expectations.

West: Yes and no. I would say that the general levels of education and social and political awareness among the Gabonese I encountered (admittedly a distorted sample, as it tended to be the sort of people one meets in luxury hotels, opposition radio stations, and so forth) were markedly higher than I expected. People seemed genuinely to know what was up with regard to the state of the country and the government. At the polling stations (more reflective of the general population) there was a frank enthusiasm for the democratic process and an air of seriousness about the whole project. This was refreshing.

On the down side, the general state of infrastructure and access to facilities in general was quite depressing once we left the bord de mer [seaside] in downtown Libreville [the capital city of Gabon]. Likewise, the social infrastructure was weak. I didn’t see the University myself but I had the sense it did not have much social impact on the capital. The media seemed underdeveloped. Perhaps this is what you’d expect in a country of only 1.3 million, but I think it would be desirable to see the emergence of a politically independent newspaper (and radio) rather than ones obsessed with the government and the opposition view of politics.

We saw a great many schools and although these were barren, they were clean, and I at least got the impression that schooling was available throughout the country. I also got the impression that this was true for girls as well as boys, and this is perhaps the most important social-development indicator for Third-World us countries.

TMH: How did you pursue your responsibilities as election observers? (For instance, did you attend political rallies, visit party headquarters, talk to voters, read local newspapers, etc.?)

Lanigan: It was never clear what our “responsibilities” were, so we made a lot of it up as we were going along. We did all these things: visited party headquarters, met candidates, attended rallies, spoke with foreign media. (I didn’t have a lot of one-on-one conversations with locals or read local papers because of language barriers, but our team certainly did.) We even had one of the Bucherons organizers come to our hotel to discuss list irregularities. We had a couple discussions with the Canadian Ambassador related to the election as well. I thought we used our time wisely and took in as much as we could.

West: We attended four rallies, although they were uniformly so late in starting that we really only stayed for the speeches at one. These were for the candidates Mba Abessole, Kombila, and Bongo. There was a fourth, but it was sparsely attended and we did not stay long. Following the Abessole rally, which was well attended and for which we were able to observe the entire rally from beginning to end, we were invited to visit the opposition radio station, Radio Soleil, which was being used as a party headquarters for the RNB.

I bought essentially every newspaper I could lay my hands on. Although I didn’t have time to read them all, I did go through all the headlines and read a number of the more relevant articles. I feel I got a general sense of the state of the media, which reminded me strongly of state-controlled publications I had seen elsewhere, such as the China Daily and the former Daily News in Hungary.

I wish I had been able to talk with more voters, but we did encounter quite a lot at the polls, and were able to talk briefly with cab drivers, hotel waiters, etc.

TMH: In your observations, did it appear that all candidates were able to put their case to the voters in a reasonably free and fair fashion?

Lanigan: In one sense yes. We attended a large Abessole rally in which there were military present. They were very friendly, the point of joking with the crowd and rally organizers. There was no intimidation by the military, only the intention to keep the event orderly. There was no restriction on materials distributed or what was said.

In another sense no. There is no question that the incumbent used the power of government to his advantage. On the first day we were there we heard a bunch of sirens and came out of the market to see what was up. It was the state police clearing the street to escort a bus load of Bongo supporters—just one of several examples including Bongo posters exclusively on government buildings, and money coming out the you-know-what, etc.

At one opposition rally they were complaining that the election commission had denied them a rally down by the water front even though Bongo was holding a rally in the same location.

So yes, there was openness, we saw several rallies and advertisements to suggest there was no harassment or intimidation but at the same time opponents of Bongo had the deck stacked against them.

West: Yes. I have no doubts at all about this aspect of the election. In fact, I would say that with regard to equal access to the electorate, this election far exceeded anything I have ever witnessed in Canada or the United States.

TMH: Did you observe any attempts by the government to inhibit or obstruct participation by political activists of an party? Did you see any examples of police or army intimidation of voters or activists?

Lanigan: Yes, I believe there was intimidation at voting stations. In areas of low support for Bongo, there would be a disproportionate amount of military (riot gear, gas canisters, the whole nine yards). One of these stations didn’t get around to opening until past 1:00PM [and] impatient voters left. Four hundred people registered to vote and only four ballots in the box! By “intimidation” it is not necessary to bust heads. We verified in conversation with people that they were intimidated by the military presence. In a couple of places I too was uncomfortable. Julian has more specifics on the different types of military present in different areas, which is important to understanding “intimidation.”

West: I saw a very heavy army presence at the polling station in Lalala which was the focus of an extended discussion in the British [observer team’s post-election] report. Late in the afternoon, I witnessed several ballot boxes containing fewer than 10 ballots from an electoral roll of 500, and one which was entirely empty. I put this down to the army presence—the ballot is not secret if yours is the only one in the box, so no one wants to cast one of the first ballots. In Canada, when a box contains few ballots it is mixed with another box before the count, to preserve the secrecy of the vote. I witnessed that this was not the case in Gabon—boxes were opened and counted in public with as few as half-a-dozen ballots in them. It would have been an easy matter to track which names were crossed off the list as having voted, and therefore to disprove a voter’s claim that he or she had voted a certain way.

The British team observed that another reason for the low turnout at this location was that the station had been moved with inadequate notice to the electors (likely in violation of the election law).

That both these things took place in a known opposition stronghold is a real cause for concern. After the close of polls, we encountered an angry mob who pointed to the situation in Lalala as evidence that the count was being rigged, conducted behind closed doors by army troops rather than openly. Half an hour later, we saw a truckload of riot troops headed south towards Lalala.

TMH: On election day itself did the polling stations operate at or below your expectations? Did it seem that the voter lists were accurate? Were any voters turned away from the polls without having an opportunity to vote? Did you see any voters attempt to vote more than once?

Lanigan: For the most part the polling stations exceeded my expectations I was really struck by the earnest and sincere conduct of the poll officials. Although some arguments broke out over rules and duties of various actors (especially party scrutineers) that was in my view more a function of education and not ill intent.

Yes, there was one outrageous example of a poll president refusing to allow a registered voter to vote because the man looked like he was from Mali. The military did not intervene even though a fight very nearly broke out. We reported the incident immediately. The man should not have been refused a vote. Also, several people were turned away because they were not on the list, they told us the election commission said it was not necessary to re-register if you were on the list in 1993. Apparently everyone had to reregister.

No one I saw attempted to vote more than once.

I have no idea if the voters’ lists were accurate. The opposition parties don’t think so. I really don’t know how we could know this despite our requirement of comparing lists posted outside to the lists held inside by the poll president.

West: In Libreville, I mostly saw disorder, with many stations which had not opened by late morning.

We heard numerous complaints about “doublants” and names missing from the electoral rolls. A person who had registered might be missing from the rolls, or missing a voter’s card, or both. One voter showed us two voting cards which he claimed were both issued to him, one under his French name and one under his African name. We also met polling-station officials who had similar documentary evidence of “doublants.” However, I am generally inclined to accept that this was due to bookkeeping errors rather than fraud. I say this for two reasons.

First, the fact that the recommendations of the advance observer teams that more care be taken around electors lists were not followed—this practically guaranteed that errors would occur. Second, the number of inaccuracies in the lists was not astonishing by Canadian standards—errors of this kind will simply occur when managing a database of hundreds of thousands of voters.

TMH: Were you able to observe the transport of ballot boxes from polling places to the electoral commission? Did they seem to be handled in a secure fashion? Were there any opportunities for fraud or mismanagement at this stage of the process?

Lanigan: No, I did not see the transport of boxes. We were al caught in a small riot immediately after some polls closed. A group of opposition supporters furious that some names were not on a list turned on us. (It frankly seemed to have more to do with a hatred of Bongo than it did any process irregularity. They got even angrier when they realized we didn’t speak French.) Anyway, we finally got back to the car when they surrounded it and started shaking it. To make a long story short, at that point in the evening we had things other than the transport of boxes on our minds.

However, the counts we did see appeared very genuine. We have asked the Ambassador to track down final poll results and we will verify against our own records before submitting our report.

West: No. I was not able to observe this. This is my major concern about the electoral process. Although I believe the campaign was fair and the vote was free, I have no personal evidence to inspire confidence in the count.

I was able to witness the count of half-a-dozen boxes. However, unless I can cross-check the numbers I witnessed with a published list, I have no way of knowing that the vote-totals were not simply fabricated.

I have asked the Canadian ambassador to help me obtain this list, but I have not had a response. In addition to the detailed poll-by-poll list, I would also need some reliable assurance that most of the ballots were dealt with in the way I observed—an open count subject to public scrutiny. If, on the other hand, most were counted behind closed doors, then I can say nothing about the fairness of the election. The exemplary openness and access to media would be beside the point.

TMH: Did you observe any irregularities or mismanagement that might have had an effect on the outcome of the election?

Lanigan: Yes, excessive military presence in what appeared to be select polling areas, either incompetent or corrupted election officials opening the polls at 1:30 in the afternoon (voters left).

West: See my earlier comments about rural areas where turnout was very high (probably above Canadian levels of 65-70 percent) contrasted with urban, opposition-dominated areas where turnout approached zero. Whether this was intimidation, fraud, or mismanagement, it surely had an effect.

TMH: if you were to make suggestions for improving the electoral process in Gabon, what would they be? (Please be as specific as possible.)

Lanigan: Work on ways to build public confidence surrounding the voters list. Just about everyone we spoke to had very little faith in it. Relax on the military already . . . Good question, see what the others say, and I’ll think some more on it.

West: Honestly, I endorse all the recommendations made by the advance team of observers. I was able to see that many of these were not followed, to the overall detriment of the process.

TMH: Would you be willing to serve as an election observer again, in Gabon or in any other country?

Lanigan: Absolutely . . . do you know of any other opportunities in Africa or elsewhere?

West: With the greatest pleasure, in any other country. (Well, at this point perhaps not in Yemen, or maybe Congo. But pretty well any other country.)

TMH: Do you have any other comments on your experience during the Gabonese presidential election?

Lanigan: Yes, “crab facie” is fantastic local dish. I don’t understand why everything is so expensive, even for the locals. Their electoral system (French run-off)—despite some of the pitfalls of process—is far more democratic than Canada’s. Thank you for this opportunity of a lifetime. 1 will never forget it.

West: I once spent four months in Hungary as an undergraduate student. After the program we were asked to write down some comments for the benefit of future participants. Any words I could find fell short of what I wanted to say, so I probably never completed the form at all. One of my buddies, David Wagner (now an associate professor at the University of Waterloo), simply wrote: “an incredible experience.” This became the quotation used on all the publicity posters for the program for the next decade.

Here is my comment on Gabon: “an incredible experience.”

The three photos featured above were taken by me and appeared in The Metro Herald in 1999, in black-and-white. The captions have been modified to reflect the year they were shot.

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Happy Canada Day!

Let's take a few moments to wish our friends to the north a happy Canada Day.

It was on this day in 1867 that a brave band of Canadians ventured into the deepest, densest, darkest, most treacherous section of London, seeing to it that a bill passed the British Parliament to grant the provinces of North America a measure of autonomy. A hard-fought semi-independence, indeed!

In honor of the holiday, I have selected a few video clips for entertainment purposes only.

First, from Rose-Marie, Nelson Eddy and Jeanette MacDonald sing "Indian Love Call":

Next, Natalie Nevins performs the Big Band classic, "Canadian Sunset," on a 1966 episode of The Lawrence Welk Show. Ah-one, ah-two:

Third, Bob and Doug MacKenzie celebrate in the Great White North fashion(with beer):

Finally, Alanis Morrisette sings the Canadian national anthem, "O Canada," at -- naturally -- a Stanley Cup hockey match, in both English and French:

Célébrez, mes amis!


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Canadian Content

"What's good for the goose is good for the gander," goes the proverb.

Yet when it comes to economic protectionism, neither goose nor gander gets what's good. No matter who plays the protectionism game, everybody loses. (See Smoot/Hawley.)

Now Canadian municipal officials are biting back at the protectionism provisions of the Obama administration's economic stimulus package. Their argument is, if Canadian businesses are excluded from providing services to American states and cities under the stimulus rules, then American firms should be excluded from providing services to Canadian cities.

Thus the downward spiral begins.

Here's the beginning of the report from the CBC:

In response to the 'Buy American' provisions of the U.S. stimulus package, Canada's mayors narrowly passed a resolution Saturday that could potentially block U.S. companies from bidding on city contracts.

The resolution was passed at the Federation of Canadian Municipalities conference in Whistler, B.C., by a vote of 189-175.

The resolution says the federation should support cities that adopt policies that allow them to buy only from companies whose home countries do not impose trade restrictions against Canadian goods.

The Whistler Question (isn't that a great name for a newspaper?) noted how the vote was nearly split down the middle, and asked politicians who voted each way for their reasons:

Dianne Watts, the mayor of B.C.'s second-largest city, Surrey, voted in favour of the resolution because she said Canada needs to have a level playing field with its neighbour.

"We support free trade. We support open markets. But we've seen our local companies having to lay off workers because they've been hit directly by American policies," said Watts. "One company, their materials were on the site in the States and they sent them back."

But almost as many voted against it, fearing that it would just provoke Americans more and, worse, that it's un-Canadian.

"By lashing back, we're becoming more American," said Claude Elliott, the mayor of Gander, Nfld. "We need to take the high road and rise above that. We're negotiating with a U.S. company right now to set up in Gander and we don't need to put up any barriers."

In southeast Saskatchewan, where a booming oil industry attracts all kinds of American interests, Weyburn city councillor Bill Rudachyk didn't see anything to be gained by introducing protectionist policies or even threatening to.

"Two wrongs don't make a right," said Rudachyk, whose town recently hosted the second-biggest oil show in Canada, which attracted U.S. companies. "And we don't want retaliation."

An editorial in the Edmonton Journal is worth a read:

... other local leaders and organizations such as the Ottawa Chamber of Commerce are clamouring for our own "Buy Canadian" policy to combat the American move. After all, they contend, much of our stimulus package cash is designed for local projects, so why not mandate it that we look out for our own?

The answer is simple enough. While buying locally, regionally and nationally often makes a good deal of sense, enshrining that practice by law is ultimately self-defeating to the interests of a nation so dependent on other markets. Provinces, and especially municipalities, which have long drawn the short stick among the levels of government in Canada, must be free to make the most intelligent buying decisions for their citizens available. Tempting though it is to give our neighbours a taste of their own medicine and reward firms contacts simply because they are Canadian, it's a bad idea that will backfire. Like it or not, we must depend on our leaders to convince our customers to remember who their real friends are, and how grave the dangers are of backsliding into darkness.

Fortunately for Canada, its chief trade spokesman understands the basic economic principles that militate against protectionist policies. He argued against the mayors' resolution, although his views did not prevail in the final vote. Reports the Ottawa Citizen:

Trade Minister Stockwell Day is concerned about the second part of this motion and is urging delegates not to adopt it, as it could set off a retaliatory round of protectionist moves that experts say would ultimately damage the Canadian economy.

He said the federal government is aware that Canadian companies are being discriminated against by U.S. state and municipal governments on some water and sewage treatment projects funded by the stimulus bills, and they are working to correct the situation.

“If one country starts to build protectionist barriers that hurt businesses in another country, there will be an impulse to retaliate, and I would like to see this resolved at the executive level in the United States,” Day said.

Canada and the United States are each others' greatest trading partners. The commerce that crosses the U.S.-Canadian border keeps both economies vital. A trade war between the two North American giants would be devastating for both, and would have horrendous consequences for the rest of the global economy, as well.

The fact is, "Buy American" or "Buy Canadian" legal mandates are misguided and harmful. Let individuals and businesses choose what products and services they want to buy (and sell) regardless of source. That is what "free trade" and "free markets" really means. That is what "freedom" means.

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Gay Conservatives Emerge in Canada

Word comes from the frozen north that gay conservatives are making their presence known in Canada, following the example of Log Cabin Republicans in the United States and TORCHE (gay and lesbian Tories) in the United Kingdom. (It goes without saying that there are also gay libertarian groups, such as Outright Libertarians and Gays and Lesbians for Individual Liberty.)

As reported on Western Standard:

Just in time for the Conservative party convention in Winnipeg, a new non-partisan organization called Gay Dominion has been launched to represent gay and lesbian conservatives.

Yes, they do exist. In fact, Western Standard readers have already come to know blogger Chris Reid, the Conservative candidate in Toronto who was forced to resign for being too conservative. Reid is also gay.

Gay Dominion states its mission(s) on its own web site:

We have two main missions. First, we want to end the isolation that many gay conservatives feel within their own community. Most of the gay media (newspapers, bloggers, websites, magazines, etc) are avowedly left-wing and do not allow for a diversity of political views. Gay Dominion would like to provide an alternative point of view on many issues that affect the gay community.

Secondly, we want the conservative community to understand that there are many gays amongst them, and that they need to welcome gays into their midst. We also want to work within the Conservative Party of Canada to ensure that gays are not left behind.

This non-partisan mission suggests that Gay Dominion hopes to play a role more similar to the Independent Gay Forum than any of the political activist groups I mentioned in the first paragraph, but it may have affinities in both directions.

There is something charmingly retro about the name "Gay Dominion," since Canada has not generally called itself a dominion since the 1950s, and in fact changed the name of its national holiday in 1982 from "Dominion Day" to "Canada Day."

The Dangers of Voting

Since I drive around a lot on Election Day -- moving from precinct to precinct, visiting each of Charlottesville's eight polling places, plus the Central Absentee Precinct and the Office of Voter Registration and Elections -- it was a shock to find. out that the most recent scientific studies show that Election Day is hazardous for drivers.

According to HealthDay News:

Driving or walking to the polls on Election Day is a longstanding political tradition in the United States, but new research suggests it might be more dangerous than you think.

After crunching traffic fatality numbers, researchers discovered that Americans were about 18 percent more likely to die in accidents during polling hours on presidential election days than on other Tuesdays.

The increased risk is greater than it is on New Year's Eve or Super Bowl Sunday, the Canadian researchers added.

Reporting on the study, Patti Neighmond of NPR interviewed the study's principal author, Dr. Donald Redelmeier of the University of Toronto, for Morning Edition:

"We studied all the U.S. presidential elections over the last 32 years, beginning with Jimmy Carter in 1976 and ending with George Bush in 2004," he says of the research, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Redelmeier studied the U.S. in particular, he says, because this country maintains excellent statistics on vehicle crashes, noting exactly what time of day, when, where, vehicle, type and other information. He compared the number of crashes, injuries and deaths on Election Day Tuesday to the Tuesdays before and after.

His research revealed an 18 percent increase in motor vehicle deaths on voting day. "This equaled about 24 people [deaths] per election," Redelmeier says, adding that "this was remarkably consistent across different locations and years."

Redelmeier also found that about 800 more people suffered disabling injuries as a result of the crashes. These injuries and deaths far outnumber those reported during times associated with an increase in drinking and driving, such as Super Bowl Sunday and New Year's Eve. Unlike on those days, Redelmeier says, alcohol didn't seem to be an issue on voting day. And the crash rate didn't increase in the evening, when people might be more likely to drink.

An extract of Redelmeier's original article can be found on JAMA's website; subscribers can see the full article.

The United Nations' Speech Police

Here's a tricky question: Is criticism of attempts by Islamic nations to limit free speech around the world itself a form of defamation against religion, and therefore subject to laws that limit speech?

The head spins.

Yet that could, in fact, be the case if current proposals before the United Nations gain a foothold and criticism of religion (any religion, not just Islam, but especially Islam) becomes a global no-no.

Our friends to the North have more experience of these sorts of laws than we do in the United States, so it's no surprise that the Canadian news and opinion magazine, Maclean's, should be interested in reporting on this issue.

In an article headlined "Stifling free speech -- globally," Maclean's correspondent Luiza Ch. Savage writes:

Pakistan brought the first "defamation of religions" resolution to the UN Human Rights Council in 1999 — before the attacks of 9/11 and a resulting "backlash" against Muslims. That first resolution was entitled "Defamation of Islam." That title was later changed to include all religions, although the texts of all subsequent resolutions have continued to single out Islam. The resolutions have passed the UN Human Rights Council every year since the first was introduced. In 2005, the delegate from Yemen introduced a similar resolution to the UN General Assembly, and it passed, as it has every year since, with landslide votes. In March, the Islamic nations were successful in introducing a change to the mandate of the UN's special rapporteur on freedom of expression — an official who travels the world investigating and reporting on censorship and violations of free speech — to now "report on instances where the abuse of the right of freedom of expression constitutes an act of racial or religious discrimination." The issue is expected to be a focal point of the UN World Conference Against Racism next year in Geneva (a gathering Canada plans to boycott after the 2001 meeting in Durban devolved into acrimonious exchanges over Israel).

The trend has rights advocates worried for numerous reasons, beginning with the language used. If the notion of "defaming" a religion sounds a little unfamiliar, that's because it is a major departure from the traditional understanding of what defamation means. Defamation laws traditionally protect individual people from being materially harmed by the dissemination of falsehoods. But "defamation of religions" is not about protecting individual believers from damage to their reputations caused by false statements — but rather about protecting a religion, or some interpretation of it, or the feelings of the followers. While a traditional defence in a defamation lawsuit is that the accused was merely telling the truth, religions by definition present competing claims on the truth, and one person's religious truth is easily another's apostasy. "Truth" is no defence in such cases. The subjective perception of insult is what matters, and what puts the whole approach on a collision course with the human rights regime — especially in countries with an official state religion.

Savage cites an issues brief written by Angela Wu of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, an American non-profit whose mission is explained by its name. (I can imagine a number of mullahs exclaiming the equivalent of "Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?" when confronted by expressions of religious freedom.)

The brief's "executive summary" explains:

The “defamation of religions” issue is fundamentally inconsistent with the principles outlined in the United Nations’ founding and legal documents, but more importantly, it violates the very foundations of the human rights tradition by protecting ideas rather than the individuals who hold ideas. Further, they force the state to determine which religious viewpoints may be expressed. The empowerment of the state (as opposed to protection of individuals against the state) through “defamation of religions” measures is thus unique in the human rights regime. “Defamation of religions” resolutions at the UN operate as international anti-blasphemy laws and provide international cover for domestic anti-blasphemy laws, which in practice empower ruling majorities against weak minorities and dissenters.

In its concluding "recommendations" section, the brief says:

Religious freedom is best preserved through protection of religious exercise of people of all faiths, not through restricting the speech of people of some faiths. “Defamation of religion” laws claim to protect vulnerable religious communities and the civil dialogue.31 However, there are already laws against assault, false imprisonment, fraud, and even defamation of persons. “Defamation of religion” laws in practice act as a form of thought control and work solely to the advantage of religious majorities that have the power to sanction which ideas should be permitted in the public square.

It is up to the Western liberal democracies to stand up to these attempts to constrain religious freedom and freedom of expression (freedom of speech and of the press). Nobody else will do it for us.

New York Gov't Encourages Growth of Organized Crime

The big news from New York today is that a new cigarette tax has become mandatory. As Paul Merrill reports for Albany TV station WXXA:

A statewide tax increase of $1.25 per pack of packaged cigarettes went into effect on Tuesday, bringing the total tax on a pack of cigarettes in New York State to $2.75.

The increase is estimated to bring the state's total tax revenue from cigarettes to approximately $1.3 billion.

That total is not increasing directly proportionally to the tax increase per pack because the state realizes many smokers will find other ways of getting their cigarettes or simply kick the habit altogether.

A pack of cigarettes in the Capital Region now costs about $6.

Additional taxes in New York City put the cost of a pack of cigarettes there closer to the $10 mark.

Some argue that this latest tax increase will push smokers to Native American stores, the Internet, or bootleggers who transport cigarettes across state lines.

We'll get back to that last point momentarily. But Jon Dougherty of WTVH-TV in Syracuse notes another effect (the grammatical error in the first sentence is his, not mine):

The average price of a pack of cigarettes is pushing $7.00, and independent smoke shop owners are seeing less customers because of it. Smokers buying cigarettes will have to pay up to $2.00 more per pack. At Tobacconist in Armory Square, a pack that cost $5.00 yesterday, will cost you over $6.50 today. The owner says that's going to hurt business.

A few blocks away, smokers were hesitant to buy cigarettes at the Downtown Smoke Shop in Syracuse today. The higher price left business slower than normal.

Smoke shop owners are afraid of losing customers to Indian Reservations, where there are no taxes on cigarettes. We spoke to the Onondaga Nation Smoke Shop. They say they've received more phone calls from customers wanting to know their price for cigarettes. The store sells pack $2.00 to $3.00 cheaper than in the city. For small smoke shops, that's hard to compete with.

While smoke shop owners off the reservation might be sad and smoke shop owners on the reservation might be glad, those laughing most heartily today are mobsters and terrorists who rely on cigarette smuggling for large portions of their tax-free, cash income.

It's not like this effect is unknown. I wrote about it more than a decade ago for The Metro Herald, which published the following article on April 17, 1998:

Higher Cigarette Taxes Set Stage for New Crime Wave
Richard E. Sincere, Jr.

(Arlington, Va.) --- The proposed federal settlement with the tobacco companies -- now in limbo as the tobacco companies have, at least for the moment, backed out -- includes a provision that federal excise taxes on cigarettes will rise from $1.10 (the congressional proposal) to $1.50 (the president's preference) a pack over the next several years. Experience in many states and foreign countries teaches us that such a tax increase will lead to more cigarette smuggling by organized criminals, with the likelihood of gang violence as various crime syndicates battle for "turf" in the contraband cigarette market.

In congressional testimony last December, Robert A. Robinson of the General Accounting Office (GAO) reported that "smuggling cigarettes from low- to high- tax states, or interstate smuggling, prominent in the 1970s, may now be a reemerging problem . . . In fact, recent estimates suggest that smuggling is responsible for states collectively losing hundreds of millions of dollars in annual tax revenues." The problem is also international in scope, as Robinson explained:

"International smuggling has occurred recently between Canada and the United States. According to the Canadian government, sharp increases in Canadian federal and provincial cigarette taxes in the late 1980s and early 1990s led to large-scale smuggling between the United States and Canada conducted almost entirely by organized crime. Violence increased, merchants suffered, and in one year alone, Canada and its provinces lost over $2 billion (in Canadian dollars) in tax revenues. Canada responded in 1994 by sharply reducing federal and provincial cigarette taxes . . . Since then, smuggling has declined considerably."

Writing in Reason magazine in 1995, Ed Carson explained how Canada's rising tobacco taxes set into motion the law of unintended consequences. "The result was an invitation to organized crime. Mohawk Indians from tribes along the U.S.-Canada border, biker gangs, and Asian Triads smuggled cigarettes across the border in boats, airplanes, trucks, legitimate courier companies, and snowmobiles. By the end of 1993, nearly one in three cigarettes was contraband."

In February of this year, Erin Schiller of the Pacific Research Institute noted the perverse, unexpected effects of Canada's cigarette tax. Despite the steep tax hike, Schiller wrote in the Washington Times, "youth smoking did not decrease and many officials ironically argued that high taxes made it more difficult to control youth smoking."

How could this be? Notes the GAO, "According to the Canadian Prime Minister, as the portion of the Canadian market supplied by smuggled tobacco increased, the average price paid for cigarettes dropped. Access to cheap contraband tobacco undermined the government's health policy objectives of reducing tobacco consumption, particularly among youth."

In perhaps the most delicious irony, U.S. college students living near the Canadian border made a practice of going on "drinking holidays" to Canada, where the drinking age is lower. To pay for their vacations, they would take carloads of low-priced U.S. cigarettes to sell or trade for liquor.

Canada is not alone. Washington Times correspondent Erik Kirschbaum reported in early 1996 that a similar smuggling problem was occurring in Germany. Cigarette smuggling led to "a surge in gangland-style executions and turf wars [that] made Berlin streets more dangerous than at any time since World War II," he wrote. "Authorities fear that cigarette trafficking is leading to crime empires dealing in extortion, prostitution, stolen cars, drugs, and weapons." Kirschbaum quoted a Berlin police detective as saying that "people are being executed in cold blood in their apartments and in broad daylight on the streets, on subway platforms, in front of hundreds of witnesses."

Weeks later, Paul Geitner reported in USA Today that "turf battles between the Vietnamese gangs that control street-level sales have been blamed for the deaths of 40 Vietnamese, 15 in Berlin alone [in 1996]." These killings, he said, are "the latest episode in a bloody gang war over Berlin's lucrative trade in smuggled cigarettes." The reason? Just one truck loaded with 50,000 cartons can net a smuggler $550,000 in profits.

According to former Treasury Department official Bruce Bartlett, all across Europe, high taxes are resulting in a bonanza for smugglers. "One-fourth of the world's cigarettes are now smuggled across national borders to evade taxes and tariffs," he wrote last August. "Governments are already losing $16 billion per year in tax revenues -- a figure likely to rise as organized crime becomes a larger player in the business of smuggling smokes. In Italy alone, organized crime is said to make $500 million per year smuggling cigarettes."

As long as tobacco remains a legal commodity, efforts to control its consumption through regulation or taxation are doomed to fail. This was the case during the blundering "noble experiment" of alcohol prohibition, when possession of alcohol was legal but the sale and importation of it were not. This created an instant black market for criminal kingpins like Al Capone and Joseph P. Kennedy, giving birth to organized crime in this country. With excessive cigarette tax rates, the Mob will have just one more outlet for criminal entrepreneurship.

It's obviously time to rethink the tobacco settlement -- particularly the misguided idea of raising cigarette taxes.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Richard Sincere, a nonsmoker, chairs the Virginia chapter of the Republican Liberty Caucus (www.rlc.org).

If you think the link between cigarette smuggling and terrorism -- a more salient issue today than in 1998 -- is nebulous, consider what Jim Waters of the Bluegrass Institute, a think tank based in Kentucky, wrote in the Times-Tribune on May 9:

The notion that cigarette smuggling, driven by higher taxes, created a big-enough business to fund terrorists seemed goofy.

But the truth here is at least as strange as the fiction. A report released April 29 by New York Rep. Peter King shows how terrorists benefit from high cigarette taxes.

“In total, law enforcement officials in New York state estimate that well-organized cigarette smuggling networks generate between $200,000 (and) $300,000 per week,” the report stated. “A large percentage of the money is believed to be sent back to the Middle East, where it directly or indirectly finances groups such as Hezbollah, Hamas and al Qaeda.”

Two primary strategies used by these smugglers of terror involve either smuggling cigarettes from other states with much-lower taxes. Or they make peace with Indian reservations, where cigarettes aren’t taxed.

James Damask wrote for the Mackinac Center that “fully one-fourth of all cigarettes sold worldwide are now smuggled from low-tax areas to high-tax areas to reap the criminal’s reward for government intervention in matters best left to the private sector.”

These activities are not limited to North America, with funds going to the Middle East, either. Consider this story from Sunday's Moscow Times (that's Moscow, Russia, not Idaho):

Bulgaria, an EU newcomer under pressure from the bloc to clean up its act, said Friday that it had broken up on a criminal network suspected of financing rebel groups in Chechnya.

The gang of mainly Chechens was involved in racketeering, blackmail, arms deals, money laundering and cigarette smuggling, the national security agency said in a statement. "The group is suspected of financing terrorist formations in Chechnya," it said.

Cigarette smuggling has been a staple of organized crime activity in the Balkans for years, perhaps predating the fall of the Soviet Union and the break up of Yugoslavia. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project titled one of its recent reports "Cigarette Smugglers Trade in Murder" and began it by saying:

In the Balkans, death and cigarettes are closely related.But it's not always the carcinogens that are the problem.

The illegal tobacco trade takes its share of lives.

High-profile killings connected to illicit tobacco networks in the Balkans have claimed journalists, intelligence officers, politicians and the criminals themselves. In the fight to control this multi-billion dollar criminal enterprise, gangsters often use the most ruthless methods to assert their authority and send a reminder of their power to the public at large.

In one of the more chilling examples of cigarette smugglers' disregard for life, Dusko Jovanović was shot and killed outside the paper he worked at in Montenegro, a regional cigarette smuggling hub. The then editor-in-chief of Dan, the Montenegrin daily, was gunned down in 2004 shortly after publishing a series of articles on the illicit tobacco smuggling activities of underworld kingpins.

The killing was among the most vicious in a particularly bloody period in the recent history of Montenegrin cigarette smuggling. It followed the slaying on May 30th, 2000, of Goran Zurgić, a security advisor to then Montenegrin president Milo Đukanović. Zurgić, at the time cooperating with western intelligence agencies investigating Đukanović’s business dealings, was believed to be murdered by Darko Raspopović, then head of Montenegro’s anti-terrorism unit at its Interior Ministry. Raspopović himself was shot and killed in Podgorica the following January.

Those are just a few examples of how cigarette smuggling -- which is done almost entirely to avoid tariffs and taxes, since tobacco is a legal product in most countries -- benefits the mob.

Raising taxes on cigarettes may serve some short-term goals, such as increasing revenues for governments to misspend, but in the long run, it causes more harm than good.

Travelers' Carnival

Another blog carnival -- this one the "Carnival of Cities" -- picked up one of my personal favorite recent posts to feature this week: my videoblog showcasing Hurley, Wisconsin, and Ironwood, Michigan. (That post included a peek at the Iron County Historical Museum and a conversation with innkeeper Gene Cisewski, as well as a visit to the Upper Peninsula's Hiawatha statue.)

The Carnival of Cities covers the whole world, in categories like "Cities in Europe," "Cities in Australasia," and "Cities in the Americas." It turns out that Hurley is one of two U.S. cities featured in the current carnival. Under the heading of "Cities in the Americas," host-blog Family Travel lists the following:

Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada paulmct presents Tickets Please - Or Else posted at Bloggin’ Off, saying, “There’s a lot to like about Vancouver, but…” Don’t tase me, bro!

Trinidad, Cuba Matthew Hamilton describes this dilapidated colonial jewel near Cuba’s Caribbean coast, posted at his blog Furgo Y Agua - Travels In Latin America.

Hurley, Wisconsin, USA Rick Sincere gives an interesting peek into Hurley’s history and includes video from his visit to Hurley on his blog Rick Sincere News and Thoughts, saying, “Hurley, Wisconsin, is a small city (population less than 2,000) but it and its 'twin city' of Ironwood, Michigan, are nonetheless legally designated as cities.”

St. Louis, Missouri, USA As the host, I thought I’d throw in a Family Travel blog post featuring the storied Gateway Arch, on the Mississippi river in downtown St. Louis.

Next week's Carnival of Cities will be hosted at Roaming Tales on April 30, followed by the Jeffersoniad's Leslie Carbone on May 7.

Surfing Along the Axis of Evil

The Canadian newsmagazine Maclean's has uncovered the web sites of the remaining members of the Axis of Evil and other sordid types. What Maclean's has found -- in an article entitled "Websites of Evil" -- turns out to be (from the perspective of the web site owners) unintentionally humorous.

Take North Korea, for instance:

If there was one country you'd expect not to have a website, it might be Kim Jong Il's so-called "Hermit Kingdom," North Korea. Then again, Kim could claim to have invented the Internet himself and it wouldn't look out of place at korea-dpr.com. The "brief history" of dear leader's life runs 160 pages; his father's clocks in at 2,161. And the website has a shockingly liberal relationship with facts. For instance, the regional map provided acknowledges the significance of the 38th parallel, as does the "geography" page—but, in boasting 222,209,231 square kilometres of surface area, it seems to be claiming the entire peninsula for the revolution.

In the "business opportunities" section, visitors learn that North Korea "will become in the next years the most important hub for trading in North-East Asia." How will this be accomplished, considering the country's 85th-ranked GDP—149th, per capita? Thanks to the "lowest labour cost in Asia," a "very stable political system, without corruption," and the unbeatable convenience of dealing directly with the government and state-owned corporations. No middlemen!

You can see all this for yourself on one of the periodic tourist junkets organized by the Korean Friendship Association. Undoubtedly the slickest section of the website, it teases the adventuresome traveller with an idyllic panorama of Pyongyang, including a strangely blurred but nevertheless impressive view of the mammoth Ryugyong Hotel. You won't be staying there, however. Conceived as a little slice of Las Vegas on the Taedong River, complete with capitalist decadences like nightclubs, casinos and no fewer than seven rotating restaurants, it is best described nowadays as an empty 105-storey poured concrete shell with a giant crane marooned on top of it. It has been described as "the single most unsettling structure ever erected by the hand of man."

Then there is Iran -- you know, the place that has no homosexuals:

Thousands of miles west, but still along the Axis of Evil, you'll find Iran's surprisingly large English web infrastructure. Parts are almost charming. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's personal site, for example, includes a sample gallery of gifts he's received from visiting dignitaries both domestic and international. An unnamed lawmaker from the city of Neyshabor brought an ornamental pomegranate, while the Indian foreign minister favoured the President with a covered bowl. Both gifts are described as "inorganic."

Those with questions about their faith can send them directly to the Ayatollah [Khameni]...

"If somebody masturbates during the month of Ramadan but without any discharge, is his fasting invalidated?" another asks. Depends, says the Ayatollah. "If he do not intend masturbation and discharging semen and nothing is discharged, his fasting is correct. But, if he intends masturbation or he knows that he usually discharges semen by this process and semen really comes out, it is a ḥarām intentional breaking fasting."

I guess the Ayatollah Khameni is Iran's answer to "Ask Amy."

Maclean's correspondent Chris Selley looks elsewhere in the Middle East, and then to Latin America, but the results of its explorations are mixed:

The content at Hamas' palestine-info.info, likewise, is of the tenor one would expect from the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The "comment" section includes a recent piece by Khalid Amayreh, who compares the Ukrainian Holodomor to what he believes is a looming genocide in Gaza. "Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert, as well as the rest of the ruling class in Israel are more or less trying to emulate Lazar Kaganovitch and Genrich Grigorivic Yagoda, another Soviet Jewish mass murderer who probably killed or caused the death of more people than Hitler ever did," he writes. "We must mobilize … in order to prevent Israel from turning Gaza into another Auschwitz, another Treblinka, another Bergen Belsen, or another Theresienstadt. We must cross all the red lines if necessary."

Despite the freedom of information the Internet offers, however, some sites don't last. The various incarnations of Al Qaeda's web presence have disappeared. And the official website of the Colombian guerrilla organization FARC is also currently inoperative. By some accounts, the site was uncommonly slick for a terrorist organization; its content was certainly spirited. According to the Google cache, the final post, on December 20, called Colombian president Alvaro Uribe a Mafioso, a paramilitary, a buffoon, a vulgarian and a slanderous liar. But while Uribe might well have objected to this characterization, it's unlikely he was behind the website's demise. It was hosted, of all places, in Switzerland—proof, perhaps, that free speech is where you find it.

So the next time you're surfing the web late at night, be sure to leave a comment for Kim Jong Il or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. I'm sure they'll appreciate the thought. You might even get a reply -- if black-hooded thugs knocking down your door at 3:00 a.m. is your idea of a reply.

The Gales of November Come Early

Today marks 32 years since the sinking of the S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald, an event made more memorable than it otherwise might have been because of a hit single released a year later, Gordon Lightfoot's ballad "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald."

The Detroit News notes today:

The 29 sailors who died when the S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald sank in 1975 will be remembered at 6 p.m. Saturday at Henri Belanger Park near the Mariners Memorial Lighthouse.

A mail boat will take a wreath out to the Detroit River, lanterns will be lit, plaques will be on display and bagpipes will play for the ceremony. A bell will toll for each sailor.

* * *

The ship broke into two pieces and sank in November 1975 during a violent storm on Lake Superior as the ship sailed to Detroit. River Rouge is hosting a memorial because the ship's maiden voyage was from the city in 1958.

On this anniversary, a community theater group in Manitowoc, Wisconsin (a city on Lake Michigan, for the geographically-challenged) will open a new production of a play about the Edmund Fitzgerald tragedy.

According to the Manitowoc Herald:

Exactly 32 years after the Edmund Fitzgerald vanished, local audiences will be able to revisit the maritime tragedy on the Capitol Civic Centre stage.

"Gales of November," the theatrical production about the freighter's sinking, will begin at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 10, at the theater, which is located at 913 S. Eighth St., Manitowoc.

"This is a major historical event on the Great Lakes and we've got the show on its anniversary. That's a coup," said Christine Kornely, chair of the Capitol's program committee.

Three singers, four musicians and a narrator will bring the story to life. Audiences may recognize some of the performers from the popular radio show, "A Prairie Home Companion," Kornely said.

"Gales of November" was brought here because of its appeal to local audiences who live on the Great Lakes and are interested in the history and lore surrounding them, she said.

One reason the story of the Edmund Fitzgerald has struck such a chord with so many people is that it "happened at a time when people didn't expect ships to sink anymore. It's a modern shipwreck story," said Prudence Johnson, the show's director and vocalist, in a phone interview from the Minneapolis area.

That article continues:

First produced in 2005, the show is an adaptation featuring music and excerpts from the 1987 hit play "Ten November."

Pulitzer Prize-nominated playwright Steven Dietz took inspiration from the song and wrote the book, graciously allowing her to borrow from it; Eric Peltoniemi wrote the music.

"I was in the original cast of 'Ten November' back in 1987," Johnson said. "Every once in a while I would take out the tape of the music and every time I would think, 'Wow, that's great music. I would love to sing that again.' "

So she consulted with Peltoniemi, who plays acoustic guitar in the show, and they gathered up fellow cast members, including singer Ruth Mackenzie and electric bass guitar player Jeffrey Willkomm. Rounding out the cast are vocalist Claudia Schmidt, violin and mandolin player Peter Ostroushko, piano and accordion player Dan Chouinard and narrator Kevin Kling.

It's a sunny, blue-sky day here in Charlottesville, with temperatures in the upper 40s -- far from the blustery, chilly weather of the Upper Great Lakes. One of the most profound characteristics of Gordon Lightfoot's songwriting in "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" is how he lyrically brings the listener into the midst of the weather and other conditions that led to the tragedy. Echoing the tradition of Irish and Scottish ballads of previous centuries, it is no wonder that the song embedded that event of a generation ago into two nations' consciousness (the two nations being Canada and the United States).

Those who are unfamiliar with the song might check out this video from YouTube, which includes images of the Edmund Fitzgerald and the Great Lakes:

Nobody, so far, has said it better.

Dep't of Apologies: Canada Unit

An interesting email apology was sent to its readers last week from Maclean's, Canada's pre-eminent news magazine:

We regret that a quote from our leading newsletter article was placed into the subject line of this week's Storyline. For any readers who were offended, we sincerely apologize.

For what was this September 14 statement so regretful? An earlier email, with links to the magazine's cover story, with this subject line:

'Why don't you go f*@! yourself'

That headline was linked to a story with the subhead, "The best bits of Brian Mulroney's memoirs," which began:

In contrast to the unplugged Brian Mulroney of Peter C. Newman’s Secret Mulroney Tapes, the guy in the former prime minister’s Memoirs 1939-1993 is, well, prime ministerial. Or at least as prime ministerial as he can be. With some not particularly close reading between the lines — or via quotations from others, judiciously strewn about by the author — readers can see what Mulroney really thinks about some of the personalities and events of a tumultuous time in Canadian politics.

On his first run for the PC leadership in 1976: The suggestion that he become a candidate left him “shocked.” But Mulroney quickly warmed to the idea, to the extent that losing to Joe Clark was a nightmare: “I began to drink quite heavily with friends over lunch and dinner, and these sessions frequently degenerated into baleful expressions of recrimination and regret. I profanely attacked some people who had let me down.”

This eventually leads to the money quote:

On cutting loose near the end of the 1984 election campaign: “I slid open one of the windows and motioned to one of the fellows carrying an anti-Mulroney sign. I smiled with a show of molars that would have made Jimmy Carter proud. ‘Why don’t you go fuck yourself,’ I said, and closed the window.”

While one might find the full, cheeky quotation offensive in (or out of?) context, I fail to see why the bowdlerized headline -- with cartoonish punctuation marks replacing the letters in the allegedly offending word -- requires an apology from Maclean's. It's not like Mulroney dropped the f-bomb on the magazine's cover.

Still, it makes me more curious to read the former PM's memoirs.

Aujourd'hui le Canada a 140 ans

Happy birthday to our friends north of the 48th parallel!

Today marks the 140th anniversary of the British North America Act, which joined together the provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Canada (divided into Ontario and Quebec) under the single name "Canada."

The British North America Act served as Canada's "constitution" until 1982, when the passage of the Canada Act by the British Parliament resulted in the patriation of the country's basic law, severing all legislative ties to Westminster and vesting full sovereignty in the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa, with Queen Elizabeth II continuing to serve as head of state. (As Queen of Canada, she gave her assent to the Constitution Act in April 1982, which ratified the earlier legislation by the British Parliament and making Canada fully autonomous.)

It is really only since the early 1980s that Canada Day has been celebrated with any vigor. (The holiday was known as "Dominion Day" for 114 years but had been marked only by sporadic observances during that time, starting to take off after the centennial commemoration in 1967.)

Technically, Canada Day this year will be celebrated on Monday, July 2, which is also the anniversary of the day the Continental Congress voted for independence from Great Britain in 1776. This must, however, simply be considered a coincidence.

Courtesy of our friends at YouTube, here is a rendition of the Canadian national anthem (bilingue, naturellement), from a promotional video sponsored by the Canadian Coast Guard Auxiliary. (The video images do not signify; I just like the clear voice of the anonymous singer.)

For those who prefer a more off-beat rendering of "O Canada," here is a video that includes, in addition to street hockey and woodlands, a key role for the iconically Canadian Tim Hortons restaurant. As Homer Simpson would say, "Mmmmm, doughnuts." (In terms of the instrumental music, I think Jimi Hendrix might have done it better.)

Let me make a confession: I am Canadian by ancestry, eh. I have (regrettably), however, never visited the fatherland. Notwithstanding increased hurdles put in place by the U.S. government for cross-border trips, I hope to rectify this lacuna of my life someday soon.

For good measure, here are the official lyrics to "O Canada" in French and English:

Official (English)

O Canada! Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!
From far and wide, O Canada,
We stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land
Glorious and free!
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee;
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

Officielle (Français)

Ô Canada! Terre de nos aïeux,
Ton front est ceint de fleurons glorieux!
Car ton bras sait porter l'épée,
Il sait porter la croix!
Ton histoire est une épopée
Des plus brillants exploits.
Et ta valeur, de foi trempée,
Protégera nos foyers et nos droits;
Protégera nos foyers et nos droits.

Sing out this Sunday (and Monday, for good measure) in tribute to the "True North strong and free."

Pearl of Africa

Americans who have reached a certain age will remember a radio commentary by Gordon Sinclair, a Canadian broadcaster quite well-known in his own country.

In 1973, when the United States was torn apart by the Vietnam War and as the Watergate scandal was emerging as a major impediment to confidence in government, when inflation was swirling and we were on the verge of the first energy crisis, Sinclair reminded the world -- and Americans -- of the good deeds that emanated from this country:

The United States dollar took another pounding on German, French, and British exchanges this morning, hitting the lowest point ever known in West Germany. It has declined there by 41% since 1971, and this Canadian thinks it is time to speak up for the Americans as the most generous, and possibly the least-appreciated, people in all the earth.

As long as sixty years ago, when I first started to read newspapers, I read of floods on the Yellow River and the Yangtse. Well who rushed in with men and money to help? The Americans did, that's who.

They have helped control floods on the Nile, the Amazon, the Ganges, and the Niger. Today, the rich bottom land of the Mississippi is under water and no foreign land has sent a dollar to help. Germany, Japan, and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy, were lifted out of the debris of war by the Americans who poured in billions of dollars and forgave other billions in debts. None of those countries is today paying even the interest on its remaining debts to the United States.

When the franc was in danger of collapsing in 1956, it was the Americans who propped it up, and their reward was to be insulted and swindled on the streets of Paris. And I was there -- I saw that. When distant cities are hit by earthquake, it is the United States that hurries into help, Managua, Nicaragua, is one of the most recent examples.

So far this spring, fifty-nine American communities have been flattened by tornadoes. Nobody has helped.

The Marshall Plan, the Truman Policy, all pumped billions upon billions of dollars into discouraged countries. And now, newspapers in those countries are writing about the decadent, war-mongering Americans.

Sinclair continued:

I can name to you 5,000 times when the Americans raced to the help of other people in trouble. Can you name to me even one time when someone else raced to the Americans in trouble? I don't think there was outside help even during the San Francisco earthquake.

Our neighbors have faced it alone, and I am one Canadian who is damned tired of hearing them kicked around. They'll come out of this thing with their flag high. And when they do, they're entitled to thumb their noses at the lands that are gloating over their present troubles. I hope Canada is not one of these. But there are many smug, self-righteous Canadians.

Sinclair's commentary swept this country. According to the University of Delaware Library,

This address was so popular that it was inserted into the Congressional Record 23 times in 1973, sometimes with portions deleted or added. It was recorded in 1974 by Byron MacGregor with the title "The Americans: A Canadian's Opinion" and was played on top 40 radio stations. According to The Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits, it spent 4 weeks at chart position 24, starting 1/26/74. . . . The address has also been printed in the Congressional Record in subsequent years.

Sinclair's commentary came to mind because, in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, foreign countries are, in fact, coming to the assistance of Americans.

At a State Department press briefing yesterday, the department's executive secretary, Harry K. Thomas, reported:

95 countries have offered us assistance, close to a billion dollars in cash.* Eleven flights landed yesterday in Little Rock. We expect another 11 today. But our greatest -- the greatest challenge we have is to match the generous offers with the needs of the American people. The last thing we want is someone to offer something that is wonderful, but can't really be utilized. Some countries, for example, Russia, has made offers to us. We haven't refused them, but what we told the Russians was, "We need MREs" and they sent us MREs. We did the same thing with Germany. We took the MREs. The first thing we took, because we're echoing what the President said, but more importantly, it was easiest to manage was cash. And the cash donations came in and quickly went out to Red Cross and others.

Some of the contributions have been huge. South Korea, for instance, which has the third-largest deployment of troops in Iraq in support of the United States and Great Britain, has promised more than $30 million in cash and in-kind assistance. According to the Korea Times in Seoul:

South Korea pledged on Sunday to send $30 million in humanitarian aid to help the United States recover from the destruction wrought by Hurricane Katrina.

The government will also dispatch 50 rescue workers to assist the evacuation of thousands of people in New Orleans and surrounding areas as part of a government task force led by Vice Foreign Minister Lee Tae-sik.

The assistance package, which includes emergency relief supplies, was announced following a Cabinet meeting chaired by Prime Minister Lee Hae-chan.

"The government will cooperate with the civilian sector and the Red Cross to raise the funds needed for the aid," Lee Kang-jin, spokesman at the Office of the Prime Minister, told reporters.

South Korea is providing the fourth-largest amount of disaster aid, following on pledges of $100 million from three oil-rich Arab states, Qatar, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates. But even far less affluent countries are providing aid:

Other commitments have come from Armenia, Bahamas, Cyprus, Djibouti, Georgia, Hungary, the Maldives, Mongolia, Nepal and the Organization of American States, who are donating sums ranging from 5,000 to 100,000 dollars.

Azerbaijan, Australia, Bahrain, China, Gabon, India, Iraq, Ireland, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway and Saudi Arabia groups and Taiwan are down for half a million to 7.6 million dollars.

In fact, one of the countries I work for (in my professional life), Uganda, has pledged $200,000. This news release was distributed this morning by the Ugandan Embassy in Washington:

The government of the Republic of Uganda has pledged $200,000 toward relief and rebuilding efforts in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Ugandan Minister of Foreign Affairs Sam Kutesa said the money will be donated to the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund, led by former Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. “The Government of Uganda extends its sympathies to the people affected by Hurricane Katrina,” said Minister Kutesa.

“We know that, under the guidance of the two former presidents, money collected by the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund will go where it is needed most and where it can be used best,” said Kutesa, who is in Washington on previously-scheduled business.

President Yoweri Museveni said that “the United States has been generous in responding to natural and humanitarian disasters all over the world, including in Africa. Uganda has more than once been the beneficiary of this generosity, and justice requires us to aid the people in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama who have lost their homes and loved ones.”

President Museveni added: “We appreciate that, as elder statesmen, Presidents Bush and Clinton are devoting their leadership skills to raising money to help the suffering.”

Minister Kutesa noted that the $200,000 contribution will be transferred to the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund immediately.

It took more than 30 years, but Gordon Sinclair's plaintive pleadings are finally being met with a positive response. The sad thing is that such a horrific series of events had to transpire to bring about this result. The ironic thing is, this gave me an unanticipated opportunity to add more Canadian content to this blog -- in addition to news about the Moffatts and Canadian baby names.