GREED BROKE THE SYSTEM.

Our modern economic system is broken and there's mounting anecdotal evidence to suggest efforts to effect repairs are slowly tearing apart the fabric of our political system. The Arab spring has morphed into a fall of economic turmoil. Just last week Egyptian activist Mohammed Ezzeldin told protesters in New York's "Washington Square" park that he sees a connection between the spreading Occupy Wall Street movement and the spring protests against (former) Egypt President Hosni Mubarak.

"It's time for democracy, not corporatocracy, we're doomed without it" - That's the rallying cry the Canadian based magazine "Adbusters" issued to its subscribers in July in an article asking readers to protest corporate greed by staging an "Occupy Wall Street" demonstration in New York on Saturday, September 17th. They are still there, and they've been (and continue to be) joined by like-minded supporters in hundreds of cities around the developed world.

Welcome to middle-class poverty! Since that mid-September weekend in Manhattan the protest has unleashed a global outcry against the notion that the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. In the United-States (primarily) as elsewhere, there is anger and frustration over gargantuan bailouts that lined the pockets of international corporations and which have done little to help individuals and families squeezed between rising expenses, historic job losses, stagnating wages and thinning benefits. 

I wasn't around during the Great Depression but the images of  protesters in Zuccotti Park across from New York's Wall Street, at the dozens of other tent cities in town squares, or most probably later this week on Toronto's Bay Street are hauntingly similar to those of the "dirty thirties".   And, it's not just the issue of image: In the United-States inequality has reached just about the same level as at the end of the 1920's.  The 7,000 American millionaires who paid no income taxes in 2011 excepted; - Everyone has been affected. Just as with the case of the Arab Spring, it's the social media savvy young people faced with bleak economic futures, political grievances and the perils of climate change who are now effecting this demand for change.

Though some politicians have expressed sympathy with the anger towards the role the international banking and investment community has played in this endless financial crisis  paralyzing the world's economies, because there is no firm grasp on solutions; perceptions remain that governments indulge the financial elites. In the absence of tangible evidence of a dramatic shift in thinking, political institutions and economic assumptions; and in the face of (what seems to many) a "big black hole," the legion of protests grows unabated into a second month.

The onset of winter is not very far. Regardless of whether the movement has unleashed the politically creative and productive changes which are clearly needed, the "Occupy Wall Street" protests are a crystalline message that a significant number of people no longer feel they have meaningful representation from those they've elected to political office. Accordingly, they are increasingly prepared to do something about it.

THE GEORGE BUSH DECADE

Muted commemorations this weekend as the United-States marks the 10th anniversary of the start of hostilities in Afghanistan; a conflict which has cost thousands of lives and more than a trillion dollars. Sadly there is a growing list of experts who fear the country could be sliding back towards the kind of civil war which led to the radical Islamic regime of the Taliban after the Russian pull-out of a similar misadventure signalled the ultimate demise of the Soviet Union two decades ago.

It was all so predictable: In "The Daily Telegraph" of London this weekend Britain's former ambassador to Kabul, Sherard Cowper-Coles, says it's a fantasy to think the war in Afghanistan is being won. He writes that military operations will not cure the underlying disease which has hobbled the region. It's pretty well clear that no one, least of all our American allies, have expectations of remaining for another decade, though that may be the stark reality they face. The 'Telegraph' quotes former United-States Commander in Afghanistan, Retired General Stanley McChrystal, who says that America and its allies are a "little better than" halfway towards their goals in the war. Even the Afghan President Hamid Karzai, whose despicably corrupt regime has been propped-up for years by the United-States and the NATO allies (including Canada), says the mission has done..."terribly badly in providing security to the Afghan people and this is the greatest shortcoming of our government and of our international partners." No wonder that in Afghanistan this weekend the morbid anniversary is passing without commemoration by neither the government nor NATO and saddest of all, nor by the 140,000 foreign ground troops who are still stationed on the front lines. In a published report, "Jane's" the internationally respected defence publisher notes clearly that the future of Afghanistan will still "hang in the balance" after the planned departure of allied combat forces by the end of 2014. That's in sharp contrast to President Obama who yesterday told a gathering at the Whitehouse that the United-States is "responsibly ending today's wars from a position of strength." He made the remarks while honouring the military who've made the ultimate sacrifice since President George W. Bush launched the war against the Taliban regime after the Al-Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001.

In Providence, Rhode-Island meantime, researchers at Brown University say at least 33,877 people - foreign and Afghan troops, civilians, insurgents and others have died as a result of the conflict. The American Pentagon puts the cost of its own operations at $323.2 billion exclusive of costs borne by its NATO partners including Canada. Our Department of National Defence claims the cost so far has been $11.3 billion. Others have claimed that it's (in fact) closer to $22 billion. Canada engaged in the Afghan conflict in February 2002. It took on battle operations in August of 2003 with Operation Athena. History will show that it was a simplistic effort by the Liberal Government of Jean Chretien to abate American anger at our decision to stay out of President Bush's "coalition of the willing" in Iraq.

Buoyed by the initial success of the American military in routing the Taliban extremists from government in Afghanistan, the Bush Administration lost interest and quickly changed its focus to Iraq; leaving the hapless NATO allies (including Canada) to "clean-up" the Taliban's mess in Afghanistan. The problem is (and it continues to be): That while America's virtual carpet bombing of Kabul, Kandahar and other strategic targets in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks crumbled the Taliban regime - It scattered its supporters and fighters into the hills bordering Pakistan where in the decade since they've transformed from a rag-tag group of guerrilla fighters into a well disciplined and very patient militia. The irony is: That the United-States surreptitiously financed the Taliban insurgency against the Soviets two decades ago, and it continues to support (to the tune of billions of dollars each year) the Pakistani overlords who now protect them.

CYBER MORONS

The Conference Board of Canada was plain and clear in a message just a few days ago. It warned that North Americans are exposing themselves to serious unnecessary risks because we don't know enough about the technology we use every day.

The Conference Board says too frequently for most of us, cyber-calamity is just a click away. In a country where one-in-three kids under the age of 10 has a cell phone, while one-in-ten, ten years and under, has a social networking profile and e-mail address; it's perilously obvious that most of the modern technology is relatively easy to learn and to use. In a single phrase: That's the danger! You don't need to have a comprehensive level of knowledge in order to work it. Consider though that the "smart-phone" puts more technology in the palm of its user than all of the computing knowledge used to carry Neil Armstrong and his fellow space travellers to the Moon in 1969 (and bring em' back) and the result, in and of itself, can allow a person to get into cyber areas that are "difficult to manage," to be polite.

I am never at a loss for amusement, amazement and astonishment at the naivety of otherwise experienced, savvy, intelligent and educated contemporaries (as well as members of younger generations) who are victimized by the relative blanket of security we foolishly wrap ourselves with once seated behind the computer screen and keyboard. For instance the virus-like, fortunately harmless, moronic cyber "chain-letter" spread across Facebook less than 10 days ago about the network's plan to start charging a fee to its account holders...."it was even on the news" (So it must be true?) - Or - The more harmful: "Wow! I can't believe who's been viewing my profile." - A hacker application spread over Facebook which hijacks (clickjacks!) your profile and those of your friends to subject everyone to unwanted advertising.

That's just the "fun" stuff, or as someone put it recently: "The problem that exists between the chair and the keyboard." The warning from the Conference Board says our "knowledge gap" needs to close in order to protect individuals, organizations and governments from far more serious ever lurking cybercrimes. They say people use e-mail, social media and other Internet-based applications without taking sufficient time to consider the dangers of on-line crime, personal espionage and sabotage.

As for governments, including Canada's Treasury Board and the Department of Finance, they have been subject to unprecedented cyber attacks from unknown sources in recent months. As part of its national response the Federal Government will begin shortly a television advertising campaign aimed at the problem. Under Public Safety Canada's rubric "getcybersafe.ca" the TV ads and the website will offer a range of tips on security, updated threats and computer viruses and scams. The cause may be honourable, the response lukewarm; because the Conference Board study also found that most people... "ignore cyber safety campaigns."

Ultimately a cheaper and more effective solution may be just to take a break from the Internet and social media from time to time. That's the recommendation last week from Chris Hughes an early developer of Facebook. Hughes, who was among the group of Harvard students who worked with Mark Zuckerberg to develope the medium in 2004, says: "I want to continue to live in a world where people can sit through a meal without looking at a phone. I want to have days when I only spend a little bit of time in front of a screen." - Amen!

WATER: NOT JUST FOR THE COMMODE

Media personalities, screen actors, winners of the Nobel Prize have been pushing back publicly against the Keystone XL oil pipeline project set for President Obama's final approval any day now.

Demonstrators have recently moved the protests to Ottawa as it has become increasingly obvious that in Washington's politically charged atmosphere, one year out from a Presidential election, green-flagging the pipeline is a "slam-dunk"; or a no-brainer as Stephen Harper described it to Bloomberg News in New York last weekend.

The 2700 Kilometer Keystone XL pipeline will draw unrefined oil from northern Alberta through Saskatchewan to enter the United-States in Montana on its way to the petroleum refineries along the Gulf Coast of southern Texas. The economic impact and the number of jobs created along its multi-states route are simply too overwhelming for the Obama Administration, which is fighting to regain control of America's troubled economy, to ignore.

Moving-on: Every step of the way along the Harper Government's efforts to improve trade relations with the United-States (pipeline included); Canada's strategy for negotiating the enhanced "Perimeter Security" arrangements has butted-heads and been hampered by America's steadfast resolve that homeland security trumps trade. Even when trade is with its neighbourly and overwhelmingly largest international business and trading partner. Though it may be unrelalted, The Government of the United-States has already declared that "water supply" is a national security issue.

A significant element of the problem already affects several states south of our shared 49th parallel. They have now allocated their maximum existing water supplies to farming, industry and urban development. Either they will have to do with less water, or tap large new sources as the North American climate continues to change and erode largely because of our human habits and indiscretions.

Back in 2010, Canada was one of a handful of countries which abstained from a vote at the United-Nations declaring water to be a universal right. Flushed with renewable fresh water resources along with our miniscule population which is less that 0.5% of the planet's, we Canadians are already the world's largest per capita consumers of water. The simmering debate given recent new life by trend spotters, some investment gurus, and conversely little attention by policy makers, seems to suggest: Forget oil and gas -Invest in water! Back in July, the Chief Economist at Citibank, William Buiter, pretty much said so in a memo to investors: "I expect to see in the near future a massive expansion of investment in the water sector, including the production of fresh, clean water from other sources (desalination, purification), storage, shipping and transportation of water. I expect to see pipeline networks that will exceed the capacity of those for oil and gas today." (Quoted from the Alphaville Blog)

An analysis prepared by the Canadian military, and so far (it seems) largely ignored by the escalating level of incompetents responsible for our Department of National Defence, (I digress!) claims that up to 60 countries could fall into a category of water scarcity or stress by 2050. It would place Canada and our abundance of water on the path to "a key source of (political) power" or a "basis for future conflict." Parts of the draft report titled: 'Army 2040 - First Look' were seen by Postmedia News in June, before the Citibank memo was issued by the Chief-Ecnomist.

The draft of the Army report concludes that Canada's path into this hazardous and problamic future depends on the policy decisions made by the government today. Haven't seen any. - Sure hope the planned largely discredited "Law and Order" legislation before the House of Commons isn't a sign-post precursor of the road ahead.

COMMANDER PUTIN IN CHARGE

I don't know what the correct course of action is, much less a solution, to the dilemna Canadians face over Arctic sovereignty. I just know that the one we're on now isn't making us any friends, and in the long term probably won't make much difference over how the rest of the world divides-up the resources of the northern pole's lands and seas.

Prime Minister Harper has made it a priority of his government to increase the nation's presence in the North as the countries of the Arctic Council eye the vast amount of oil and the many other resources in the area. The Council created in 1996, includes Russia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden and the United States. Though Canadians may assume that we hold claim to much of the Arctic continent, check-out this list and it's pretty obvious who the big players are: America, which despite its moribund economic outlook is still a "superpower," and the Russians who with Vladimir Putin soon back in charge expect to regain post Communist bloc superpower status within the next decade or less.

Appearing before Parliament's Committee on Defence a year ago in October 2010, the Chair in Global Politics and International Law at the University of British Columbia, Michael Byers, warned that Canada's planned purchase of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) could cause "angst in Russia" and trigger an arms race over the Arctic.



Before becoming Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister last winter, Nigel Wright was closely associated with a major U.S. aircraft manufacturer (Hawker Beechcraft) that is partnered with Lockheed-Martin with whom Canada has a sole-source multi-billion dollar contract to purchase the F-35 JSF being developed for the American military.

Though Canada's Defence Ministry remains steadfast in its willingness to buy the jet fighters as replacement for our fleet of CF-18's; defence analysts, some Members of Congress, and an ever increasing number of pundits, critics and bloggers south of the border aren't even sure the stealth fighter will ever make it into full production. The F-35's skyrocketing development costs estimated at $1-Trillion have placed the plane at the top of potential military program cuts as the United-States staggers under the weight of uncontrolled spending and debt.

Regardless of the fallout in America, on the other side of the North Pole the Russians it seems aren't waiting any longer to confirm the ominous prediction from U.B.C.'s professor Michael Byers. Pretty much secure in the knowledge that former President Putin, currently Prime Minister Putin, will once more be President Putin by 2012, after the present President (Dmitriy Medvedev)announced this weekend he's bowing-out in favour of Putin's return: The Russians have just announced they are substantially increasing Arctic military presence.

Here at home both the Minister of Defence, Peter MacKay, and the Chief of Defence Staff, General Walter Natynczyk, have been chastised for their personal (perhaps frivolous) use of military aircraft. But much more significant of the deteriorating consideration Russians hold for Canada's military and our Arctic plans, their announcement followed within hours a 3-day visit by Natynczyk to Moscow which, according to DND, was to..."gain the Russian perspective on a range of issues to improve and develop Canada's military relationship with Russia." Meantime Putin was in Iceland announcing that the country would be building a total of 9 ice-breakers to expand transportation in the Arctic. The announcement follows a July commitment to establish a 2000 soldier permanent force based in the Arctic, just a month before Canada's three week long fly-in / fly-out "Operation Nanook" in the North. By the way, Russia has permanently staffed Ice Station Borneo (about 40 miles from the North Pole) since 1996 and it's made it clear on several occasions in the recent past that NATO isn't welcomed on the frozen continent. - Which pretty much explains why the course we're on up there is not likely to work to our ultimate favour and advantage.