The dark side of the sun

As solar panels are getting more popular, I'm starting to see them on rooftops all over the city. I support efforts to reduce carbon output, but people often look at me as though I have two heads when I say I have mixed feelings toward solar generated electricity. How could I possibly have a problem with pollution-free, renewable energy?

What many people often miss in all the hyper-marketing is the dark side of the sun. My first complaint is that the focus on renewable energy diverts attention away from the much more difficult task of energy reduction. The idea of pollution-free energy relieves guilt when lights are left on upstairs while playing with our gaming systems on our plasma TVs downstairs.

My second complaint is that there really is no such thing as 'free' energy, and it certainly is not ‘pollution-free’. It takes a lot of energy to produce the photovoltaic (PV) cells to begin with, not to mention the waste the cells themselves become at the end of their lives. These issues are often ignored by the advocates of solar power. If I took the many adverts at face value, I would think that it makes absolutely no pollution at all to harvest the sun’s energy.

Most distressing to me are the consequences of large-scale adoption of photovoltaic cells. An increasing number of PV cells on the market are made of Cadmium telluride. While they do not pose a human health risk during the useful life of the device, I am concerned about what happens to the PV cells after the useful life. In all likelihood, today's PV cells will become tomorrow landfill waste. As these cells hit the landfills and become saturated by leachate, the liquid that slowly forms in landfills, the cadmium in the cells will have ample opportunity to leach out of the glass and into the soil and aquifers.
Cadmium is a known carcinogen. If widely adopted and distributed, PV cells leave precious groundwater highly vulnerable to contamination. So far, Ontario has no mandated recycling programs for PV cells. The lack of a containment plan for all this cadmium leaves me wondering what type of mess future generations will inherit. Is society trading off the future of water security for cheap, guilt-free energy now?
While I’d like to see my society become less dependent on fossil fuels, the full speed ahead rampage towards green energy is leaving out vital information for Canadians. So far, very few people, business or government, are talking about the risks and downsides of various renewable energy sources. All the advertising is about the positives points of solar leaving consumers with a euphoric sense of guilt free consumption.

A frank and honest discussion must take place, openly telling Canadians what the risks associated to harvesting ‘free energy’ from the sun for electrical needs really are. In my opinion, all this talk of ‘renewable’ energy has hijacked the effort to reduce energy consumption while glossing over any negative side effects. Without an effort to substantially reduce energy consumption, investments in alternative energy will amount to little more than lip service to the environment as one form of pollution is traded for another.

Multi-culturalism in Canada

David Cameron's recent comments about the failure of multi-culturalism in the UK coupled with Angela Merkel's similar assertions about Germany a year earlier had me thinking about the fate of multi-culturalism here. Is it really a masterpiece or merely one of those art modern pieces that our tax dollars overpaid for? Has it failed us too?

In order to analyze the situation in my own backyard, I first had to ask myself, what is multi-culturalism?

My thoughts are that in its original sense, it was meant as a welcoming mat for immigrants who were looking to flee economic or political hardships in their mother countries. In the '70's, my parents came here with a few hundred dollars in hand. While their numbers were low, the Chinese community was welcomed here to do what they had to do to earn a living. To my parents, multi-culturalism meant that their presence would be tolerated while they did their best to build a life. It meant being able to live their lives while learning the customs and culture of their new adopted homeland. It meant serving up chicken balls to earn a living when they had never heard of such a dish until they set foot in this country. Fitting in was the name of the game. When I was little, my father said to me "you can do anything you want, but you better do it twice as well as everybody else if you want to stay at the same level". It was a recognition that prejudice wasn't expected to go away just because our presence was tolerated. In school, it meant that we learnt to speak English, we dressed like kids here, we did what kids here did, and in a quest to integrate their children, my parents learnt about strange customs like hiding eggs supposedly produced by a mammal for us to find over this strange holiday called Easter.

I'm now an adult, and living in Toronto. I look around and see how much 'multi-cultalism' has changed. Its not merely about tolerating our presence, each culture seems to be in a fight for its life to preserve its identity. Cultures are now asking for more than tolerance, they are asking for rule changes to accommodate them. It isn't good enough that we can go to their schools, they have to let us carry our weapons, wear our headscarves, and even hire teachers that speak our language. We want special accommodation for our holidays and insist that white folks not wish us Merry Christmas for fear of offending our respective gods.

I look at our communities. We are so desperate to hang onto the traditions of the old world, we insist our children marry only within our cultures. Is that not the definition of intolerance? When we forbid our children to marry outside of the culture, is that not the ultimate act of racism?

When I look at the contemporary sense of multi-culturalism, I see legions of grandparents tutoring their children in the tongue of their homelands. I see cultural centres meant to educate young people about their own heritage extolling the superiority of their cultural practices. I see places of worship that do more to keep us apart than help us understand one another.

When we say "welcome to Canada, feel free to pursue your economic dreams while maintaining your motherland cultural identity", the response has been "thank you, and the only way to ensure the survival of my cultural identity is to teach my children to marry only within the race to keep our traditions alive". From personal experience, this path is paved by borderline xenophobic teachings about why our own races are superior (this isn't just my culture, but I'm told many other cultures follow this same philosophy as well).

When I think about it, multi-culturalism is doomed to failure. How can tolerance go hand in hand with a strong desire to maintain multiple generations of cultural continuity?

If inter-racial relationships aren't tolerated, what then, is the definition of tolerance?

Why the Census Matters

Speaking to a young lady this morning at a breakfast meeting, I realized that there are lots of people who haven't realized what could be lost by losing the mandatory long form census.

Undoubtedly, Mr. Harper knows that making the long form census a voluntary measure will cause self selection of respondents. Most likely to not complete the admittedly daunting task of answering 63 questions will be the under educated, lower income, immigrants, and small business owners.

The loss we mourn isn't simply the loss of data, its what the data does for us as Canadians. Despite Harper's best efforts to frame the issue as a 'special interest' one, we will all feel the effects of having inaccurate biased data.

Under Harper's watch with self selected voluntary surveys, you can bet on an increase of median household income (as we will lose data points from lower income people). Suddenly, there will be no more need to fund subsidizing housing projects, and various other social programs as those people will no longer be reflected in our data.

The data gathered from the census is so much more than simply candy to a statistician. It is the facts and figures we need in order to see how demographics are changing, know where we need schools and places of worship, and ultimately, make fiscally and socially sound decisions.


As Mr. Day highlighted with his phantom 'unreported crimes' yesterday, having no data allows the government of the day to make it up as they go. Mr. Harper promised us accountability.... Let's hold him to it.

Come tell him how you feel at Queen's Park, Thursday Aug 5, at 7pm. We will assemble in hope that this terrible decision will be reversed.

Pushing for transparency

In 2006, PM Harper's campaign promise was to make the government accountable. The Federal Accountability Act, 2006 gave PM Harper some unintended consequences. The office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer was created. Its task was to effectively make sure Canadians weren't being lied to when it came to numbers and fiscal projections.

Despite giving this monumental task a token budget ($3M compared to $60M for our auditor general), the PBO has done a phenomenal job. Its given Canadians REAL NUMBERS to look at. The PBO gave us a good picture about the cost of Afghanistan, was the first to tell us how much our deficit was really going to be, and gave us the goods on our structural deficit.

The PBO often found itself at odds with the government and has even caused our finance minister some embarrassment. As our politicians want to give us rosy numbers, the PBO gave us real numbers (most of his figures that disagreed with our government is starting to prove true). His reward for such meticulous accuracy? Getting his budget slashed of course.

Please join me in supporting the PBO. It is absolutely vital that Canadians have non-partisan, accurate numbers when it comes to the financial health of our nation.

Sign this petition asking for our parliamentarians to make the PBO a independent Officer of Parliament. (So far he's relegated to the parliamentary library).

www.realnumbers.ca

Demand that Canadians have continued access to real numbers.

Tax Free Savings Account

I've ignored the Tax Free Savings Account (TFSA) issue till now as I'm no longer in the financial advising business. However, as someone who worked in the industry I will tell you how deeply disappointed I am in this scheme.

I worked in an affluent neighbourhood where dual incomes prevailed and we would certainly consider my clients "well to do". However, even then not everyone could max out on their RRSP contributions. The ones who did, would love this TFSA. My clients who made over $150k/y certainly benefit, but even so, there was hardly a shortage of tax havens to squirrel their money away (RESPs, etc).

Now also remember that RRSP contribution room GROWS with income (up to a max). Think about the people around you. If you are familiar with their financial situation, how many have reached their MAX room? Of those, how many are able to fill it, AND make use of all the other tax lowering vehicles already available?

I can tell you when I think of my old clients, even in an affluent neighbourhood, only a few could use this to their full advantage. The ones who can, we already regard as extremely wealthy. The reality is that most of us have mortgages to pay, mouths to feed, and backs to clothe.

The majority of us don't have enough spare cash lying around to fill our existing tax havens. We really don't need more. I have spent time going through receipts with clients trying to find ways to squeeze nickles out at the end of every month just to help build a small cushion for emergencies. Another 5k tax free - what a joke.

Before you jump up and down and say "what a great idea", think about the broader implications of the TFSA. It means that the very wealthy pay less into the government coffers. It means that there's more incentive to save and less to spend during these tough economic times. It means still that nothing has been done for those people who are in no position to save even for their own retirement, let alone for investing above and beyond.

At the end of the day, this scheme benefits ONLY the extremely wealthy. MOST Canadians can't find the cash to fill their RRSPs, RESPs, or even buy life insurance to protect the ones they love most.

Our Collective Failure

The Following is an excerpt from a letter I wrote a friend on October 15, immediately following the worst Liberal defeat in Canadian History. I was responding to his gloat of our defeat as well as reminding me that we had chosen a "weak" leader from the get go.

My response is below.

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

I suppose my only regret is my overestimation of the desire of Canadians to discuss policy. There's been almost no talk of policy since Martin fell and the last 37 days has been of little exception. The last 2 years has turned into nothing but a battle of the alpha males. This is the first time in my memory that an election campaign has been waged with zero talk of health care. It didn't even get by lines in the media.

The grassroots of the party (myself included) has been smacked by this defeat. Our attempt to get a real intellectual into the PMO failed miserably. We now understand why we let the "same old, same old" run the place. All attempts at honesty backfire miserably. (Martin went down over calling an inquiry if you recall)

If you think about the message we sent an entire generation of children last night, it is that ideas and policy count for less than good looks and alpha behaviour. I realized we were in for a blood bath shortly after the election call when forums had more chatter about Dion's English than about a single piece of policy.

Our failure isn't that we had the worst defeat in history. Our failure is that we never forced this to be an election about policy. You know what leadership is. Leaders groom their team to make sure they have a replacement. If Harper were to get hit by a car, where's his team? Harper is a great one man show, but leadership is about more than one man.

Personalities should never outweigh policy. But it did... and that is our collective failure.

Perspectives from abroad

I had no intention of being anywhere near the olympic venues during the games themselves but fate would have it that I recently lost my grandmother and it necessitated a trip to Hong Kong. Hong Kong is also serving as the co-host site city for the equestrian events. Everywhere I go there are signs of Olympic preparedness. I can only hope that Canadians are half as well prepped before the Vancouver games.

The major difference I notice about the games is the news coverage. Here in HK, so far I have seen extended coverage on badminton and table tennis, sports that are seldom covered by Canadian outlets. Whatever the country excels in is what we cover. Here there is little talk of rowing, track, or kayak, sports which CBC covers relentlessly.

The thing that stunned me the most was when I logged onto the CBC news website. I was watching coverage of the olympic torch relay earlier today on local news. I saw the torch go from person to person with such great fanfare. It wasn't I read CBC that I even knew there were protests along the relay path. CBC sported photo of a gigantic "One world, one dream, free Tibet" sign. I doubt most people in HK or China have any idea that such a protest took place (except for the people actually present of course).

Kudos to the propaganda machine.

My Rights are an Unintended Consequence

On the eve of the 25th anniversary of the repatriation of our Constitution, I wonder what life would be like without the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. My father immigrated to this wonderful country before the Charter came into effect and from what I am told, the world was very different then. The Charter forced logical debate over people’s rights and forced out the emotional, racial, and historical biases. I am a female of Chinese descent, and I challenge anyone to find me one country on either side of any ocean that would have granted me basic civil rights as recently as 100 years ago.

When the founders of the New World got together and came up with this idea of democracy, it is no secret that “equal” was restricted to white men in the upper echelons of society. However, they had also laid the foundations for me to vote… perhaps it was an unintended consequence.

Freedom of religion once meant that one was free to choose which sect of Christianity one would like to follow. The inclusion of Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, and all the other religions in our society ruffled many feathers I am sure. Would our MPs 25 years ago have been as enthusiastic about the Charter if they knew it would give a woman the right to an abortion and homosexuals the right to marry? Was this foresight or a serendipitous case of myopia?

It boggles my mind that there are those even in my extended family that question gay rights. If it were not for this beautiful thing called the Charter, many of our communities may not even have rights. If we expect equality, should we not treat others as equal? Should we not stand shoulder to shoulder as Canadians regardless of our backgrounds? Thank goodness for the enshrinement of our basic civil rights regardless of sex, race, or religion. As tolerant as we Canadians are, we only tolerate that which we have learnt to accept. I wonder what else society may have in store for us next.

Thank you for the right to vote, free speech, and religion. I also thank you in advance for all future rights that others or I may receive that no one has yet conceived of. That is the beauty of enshrining universal rights for all.

I would like to think that Pierre Trudeau had this foresight… but I cannot say for sure.

Don’t judge a book by its cover, but what about its first chapter?

Very few people need convincing of the importance of the internet when it comes to communications. In fact, if you don’t have an online presence, I will likely not even purchase from you. So when it comes to the sales pitch, your webpage (not to mention coming in number 1 on Google) does a huge part of your selling.

In politics, the rules are no different. If you want my vote, you have to sell me the reason why. Partisanship aside, I invite everyone to take a look at the main websites of all 5 major parties. If the website is your front door, what would you think of the homeowner? The Liberal, Green, NDP, and Bloc websites have messages from its leaders , and news articles of issues they want people to know are important to their respective parties. All seem to have positive messages (although my French isn’t great, so I won’t vouch for the Bloc site). When I go to the Conservative site, the most obvious deviation is that the site hardly has a picture of Harper. Instead, front and centre is an unflattering photo of Stéphane Dion. They spend more of their online real estate ridiculing Dion than they spend on pushing forward their own positive ideas (assuming they have any). When I see this site, I think that its creators are hateful people. Rather than proudly strutting their own stuff, they make a mockery of others. Do I really want a Prime Minister who lacks his own ideas? A Prime Minister obsessed with proving that he’s better than his opposition? I can’t get over how childish the website is and how full of hatred the Conservatives must be. Go get an idea, or at least steal one and admit to it.

I don’t want to judge the parties by their covers, but their website is at least their first chapter. The conservatives should consider a revision.

My Loyalty is not for Sale

I was very discouraged by the democratic process last night. Someone who I was campaigning for lost, but that’s not what upset me. I discovered that my candidate had paid canvassers. I had to ask myself where the people were who should be doing this out of pure conviction.

It is naïve and childish of me to think that politics should be pure… I should know better. Perhaps it is an elitist viewpoint that people should be out volunteering and contributing to the democratic process out of the courage of their convictions. Politics should be about thoughts, ideas, and the betterment of society, not money. I was hoping that the people knocking on doors with me were doing it for the same reason I was, and not because there was money at the end of the day. I know that money can buy a lot of things, but I was hoping that a seat in the House of Commons was not one of them.

On the other hand, do I really have a right to feel betrayed? If I wasn’t busy spending time on my career and making money, I could have spent more time canvassing and volunteering. I know that people need to make a living, and volunteering is a privilege of the well to do. This is my internal conflict. I want as many people to get into the democratic process as possible, but at the end of the day, only the financially elite can afford to.

I do what I do because I believe in it. Am I silly to ask the same of others? I am either standing for something, or standing in solidarity against something. Stand with me, or stand against me, but don’t stand there because you’re paid to. Stand because you believe. There is no price for my loyalty; it can only be earned.