The New War

It's not about Afghanistan, or peacekeeping. It doesn't deal with expensive airplanes, troop numbers or NATO. It's actually about ourselves and the unravelling of the seams that hold and characterize the many dimensions of this great expansive tapestry called Canada. We are quietly developing our own new arms race whose component pieces involve greed, manipulating the economy and emerging deficits and debt as a growing reality in this country. That's on the one side. On the other we have citizen anger, a loss of wealth, joblessness, increasingly unaffordable education and healthcare. This conflict has already cost Canada, in financial terms, far more economic pain than the costs of Afghanistan.As an MP, you can't really talk about it for fear of being branded socialist. I'm growing weary of the labels. My father was a Liberal his entire life, a friend of Lester Pearson, a community activist and a Liberal organizer in Alberta. This was the very Canada he feared might emerge and he struggled to spread the wealth in this country. His mother - my grandmother - was one of the best friends of Olive Diefenbaker - John's wife and a diehard Progressive Conservative. And while my parents had to carefully arrange the timing of visits so that Olive and Lester didn't appear on the same weekend, there was never any doubt that the support of the middle class - rural and increasingly urban - drove both of these powerful personalities, neither of which could be labelled "socialist."Besides, what's wrong with that term anyway. "Social" forms its root, and thanks to such impulses we got healthcare, union and women's rights, a growing understanding of environmental fragility, and a deep defence of the dignity of those in poverty and disability. It was all of these dimensions that formed the remarkable - and young - experiment that is Canada. So forget the labels, toss them, because we are greater than all these parts and believe - all of us - that the lives of the middle class and those fighting increasing financial struggle have historically formed the backbone of what was once the greatest social and economic experiment on earth.All that history has poked our collective conscience, reminding us that something is wrong. Where our parents built stability, we have permitted our national life to gradually move away from the strengths of family and community towards a wealth creation that moves almost at light speed and disappears in an instant. Some of this can't be helped in the new global economy, but much of it can be better managed. We watch as new businesses get created, then leave the scene before we hardly know they were there. Jobs are here, then "poof," they are not. The speculative frenzy in our financial communities increasingly has us making money on money rather than the products we make or the human capital that is rich in this country. In truth, we are dealing with an entirely new kind of economy that moves mercurially with opportunity and leaves just as quickly when pastures are greener somewhere else. Our loyalty to community institutions is threatened, and despite all the money that exists in this country, we never seem to have enough to build again, to find the great jobs of tomorrow, or the future for our children we cherish. We hate taxes, which are our collective bank account, yet permit and deregulate greed, even though it effectively strips us of our own fair share of the wealth that should come to every citizen as a result of living in this great country.The Canada established by our parents and grandparents didn't have an endgame that was about wealthy people getting wealthier. It was about all of us gaining and sustaining a life of opportunity. Progressive Conservative, Liberal or NDP - all fought for the extension of this basic right of citizenship. So, again, forget the labels. Our penchant for politics to forgo its championing of average Canadians and for citizens to relent on their responsibility to vote has created a pale and anemic social compact that can't hold its own against a system that merely takes our wealth away for the purpose of creating more opportunity for just a few. This isn't about a political brand but rather about Canada - and we're slowly losing it as we develop economic systems that reflect the great divisions south of the border.Speaking of America, have a look at the video below, sent to me by a friend, and tell me if you don't sense that Senator Bernie Sanders captures our own national mood. You might not agree with everything, but the overall thrust of his outlook is what an increasing number of Canadians are feeling. Watch it, and if you agree with his overall argument, then it's time to band together, citizens and their elected representatives, to take back the greatness which our parents created.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5OtB298fHY