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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2010-07-08, Page 5THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, JULY 8, 2010. PAGE 5. Astory I heard at my pappy’s knee, post- World War II, went like this: One day, circa 1940, the Nazi High Command was sitting around discussing ways to destroy Great Britain. The Blitzkrieg bombers were being turned back by the RAF. The V-2 rockets were only sporadically successful. Panzer troops were too overextended for a cross- channel invasion. How about, someone suggested, blanketing the British Isles with counterfeit money – ten-, 20- even 50-pound notes as perfectly fabricated as German technology could concoct, so fiendishly accurate even monetary experts couldn’t detect them? The story went that Himmler shook his head and murmured “No. That would be too cruel”. The story was, of course, as phony as a three-dollar bill. Nothing (certainly not an illicit printing job) was too cruel for those arch thugs of the 20th century. In fact, the Nazis did launch an elaborate plot to blanket Great Britain with impeccable quality bogus British currency. We’ll never know how devastating the scheme might have been because (a) the Brits got wind of it and (b) the Nazis were defeated before it was fully mobilized. In any case, Nazis were Johan-come-latelys in the forgery biz. Common crooks have been tinkering with currency and tampering with coinage pretty much since money was invented nearly three millennia ago. Nations have tried their hand at forgery before as well. The Brits cranked out fake Continental dollars to hamstring the Americans during the Revolutionary War; the U.S. Feds did it to the Confederate South in the American Civil War. Ironically, the Feds blew it. The bogus Confederate currency they manufactured was easily recognizable because it was infinitely superior to the ‘real’ thing. Government counterfeiting still goes on. North Korea – which, if it were a dog, would be declared rabid – turns out virtually no agricultural or industrial commodities for the world’s markets. What it does produce are illicit drugs, fake Viagra and sheets and sheets of fake American hundred-dollar bills. Very good ones. Kim Jong Il’s mob employs top of the line Swiss-made intaglio printing presses which only governments can purchase. North Korean diplomats and other toadies then pass the bills at overseas racetracks, casinos and other venues that accept large bills without question. American authorities estimate that over the past number of years, North Korea has slipped over $1 billion worth of fake American currency into the world’s financial bloodstream. Not that counterfeit money always has to be sophisticated. Police in Greensburg, Pa. recently arrested a woman for ‘theft by deception’ after she paid for some clothes at a Fashion Bug store – with an American $200 bill. You know – the one with George W. Bush on the front? And the legend on the back that reads “We Like Broccoli”? As a forgery, the bill was just slightly more high tech than Monopoly money. A spokesman said that police were ‘unsure’ how a clerk could be taken in by it. And here in Canada? A couple of weeks ago I got up to the cashier at a supermarket with a buggy full of groceries, laid them on the conveyor belt and presented the cashier with a Canadian hundred dollar bill. We don’t take those,” sniffed the cashier. “What do you mean?” I said. “I just got this from my Credit Union. Read the small print. It says ‘Bank of Canada. This is legal tender’”. My cashier shrugged loquaciously. Final score: grocery store one, Black, nil. Fortunately, I’m a generous man who doesn’t hold grudges. I even let them put all my groceries back on their shelves. Later, I checked with a Mountie and she told me that a lot of Canadian businesses routinely refuse to accept Canadian $50 and $100 bills these days. It’s probably because of a huge counterfeiting ring that operated for a few months near Windsor, Ontario back in 2001, pumping millions of dollars worth of fake 50s and 100s into the economy. As for my shopping impasse, it could have been worse, I suppose. Back in the mid 1990s German police arrested a guy on his way to our shores with nearly $11 million worth of counterfeit Canadian currency in his knapsack. Make that counterfeit Canadian Tire currency. I’m glad the cops nailed him before he got to a Canadian Tire outlet on this side of the pond. With my luck I’d have been standing in line behind him at the checkout. Arthur Black Other Views Phony as a three-dollar bill It really felt like I was watching a movie, or even some news coverage from some far- flung, war-torn country, late last month as the G-20 summit rolled into town. But no, it was live and it was in Toronto. As someone who grew up in the Greater Toronto Area, I was shocked and upset by what was happening to the city and as a police officer’s son, I was truly saddened and angered as I watched people kick the windows of police cruisers, set them on fire and then applaud when the inevitable explosion came. My support for our police officers has been no secret, so it was no surprise that I had to forcibly pluck myself from news coverage in order to collect myself and let anger subside. Streets I walked for 15 years were filled with people who felt their lives had been made so difficult by police over the last few hours that they would tear the city apart. In order to prove whatever point they were trying to prove, they inflicted millions of dollars in property damage, endangered the lives of citizens and police officers and as a result, the only discussion they incited with the decision- makers was who was going to pay to clean up the mess. Not only did they detract attention from their own cause, but many peaceful protesters who were there for real causes and went about lobbying for their interests in a conscientious manner also found their interests overshadowed by Black Block-style protests. After reading a quote by an “anarchist organizer” in The Globe And Mail,I was reminded of the movie,Fight Club. When speaking of fellow protesters, he said, “they are your co-workers and neighbours, your teachers or students, your relatives.” When the supposed cathartic activity of fighting each other becomes too benign for Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt) in Fight Club,he begins what is called Project Mayhem, a guerrilla unit hell-bent on causing general chaos in the world. He insists that the members of Project Mayhem are not so different from those they protest, they just want more respect. “We cook your meals, we hurl your trash, we connect your calls, we drive your ambulances, we guard you while you sleep,” he says. Black Block-style protests involved masked people scurrying through the city in the shadows, popping up through sewers to inflict damage on a city that had done nothing to them. And now that the world’s leaders have left, it is we who are left to clean up the mess. So when I hear stories of residents who may have been wrongfully arrested for a few hours, accidentally getting scooped up with protesters, people who had to stand in the rain while police conducted an investigation, they were angry, saying they must have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, I felt something (someone) was getting lost in the shuffle. Unfortunately, police officers are never given sympathy for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. They are always expected to be right, no matter what the circumstances. Protesters (supposedly) had problems with the thought of a world tax, which would lead to world government and a new world order. And because the police were charged with protecting a city, a hatred for them grew within protesters who attacked with rocks, ball bearings, bottles of urine and clubs implanted with fish hooks, simply for being police officers and doing their jobs during a meeting they had nothing to do with. Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time. McGuinty needs to give voice to demos Project Mayhem Premier Dalton McGuinty needs to move quickly to ensure people who demonstrate in the streets to make their views known are heard as much by his government and the legislature as groups who are better financed and organized and even employ professional lobbyists, including most of his former staff. This would be a way of helping compensate for his government’s glaring gaffe in which it secretly changed a law to restrict demonstrators and did not seem to know what it meant. Police revealed the law was changed and said it banned and allowed them to question and arrest anyone approaching closer than five metres to the security fences surrounding the G20 Summit and the premier seemed to agree, but it turned out it banned penetrating more than five metres inside the fences. The confusion and secrecy have hurt McGuinty’s image, although previously he had expressed more sympathy for demonstrators than any earlier premier. McGuinty a week before, avoiding provincial employees demonstrating because they might lose their jobs through privatization, said they were an important reminder to proceed with caution. “It’s important they be there,” he said. “These are people. This is how they earn a living and raise their families.” Premiers usually have not been as charitable to those who demonstrated against them. Progressive Conservative Mike Harris was the most demonstrated against, because he cut jobs. Demonstrators followed him in a bus in one election and pelted him with food and an egg splattered his pant leg. They invaded his picnic in his hometown and Harris, who was not short of answers, told them it was unreasonable to do business on a Sunday. A bomb threat was phoned to a hotel where he was attending a dinner. Children booed him when he welcomed South African hero Nelson Mandela in Toronto and Harris said he was disappointed children were brought into a political confrontation. Harris said, “I don’t do demos” and almost all the demonstrators against him were union members probably paid time and half for it, and “I am firm and determined and will not be thrown off my agenda,” and rarely was. Liberal premier David Peterson suffered his most serious demonstration when he called an election and an environmental activist seized his microphone and took over most of his press conference. Peterson also had difficulty keeping his temper and when a demonstrator called him “the poverty premier” retorted “get a job,” which prompted complaints he sneered at the unemployed. He said he would “love to take a swing” at another heckler, but refrained. New Democrat Bob Rae faced demonstrations particularly by well-financed business groups, one of which erected a sign picturing him as a jackass, which the provincial transportation ministry forced it to remove as a distraction to drivers. Conservative William Davis in his first election as premier was followed by crowds protesting against his refusal to extend funding to the end of Catholic high school. Davis faced the biggest demonstration when he announced he would ban teachers from striking and they descended on the legislature in thousands and changed his mind. McGuinty has faced a few demonstrations by environmentalists, farmers and truck drivers, but nothing on such a scale. One reason is he has built close relationships with public sector workers by supporting generous pay raises for them before the economic recession, although this could change when he has to get to grips with cutting his record budget deficit. McGuinty’s problem is not that people have demonstrated against him, but that he sneakily brought in a law to restrict demonstrators. But he should have genuine sympathy for demonstrators, because more affluent and organized groups such as business, doctors, accountants and other professionals meet politicians in cozy receptions at Queen’s Park regularly and often employ lobbyists. Those who aren’t financed as well have no similar inside track and are forced to march in the streets and it is time the politicians recognized this. Eric Dowd FFrroomm QQuueeeenn’’ss PPaarrkk Shawn Loughlin SShhaawwnn’’ss SSeennssee Letters Policy The Citizen welcomes letters to the editor. Letters must be signed and should include a daytime telephone number for the purpose of verification only. Letters that are not signed will not be printed. Submissions may be edited for length, clarity and content, using fair comment as our guideline. The Citizen reserves the right to refuse any letter on the basis of unfair bias, prejudice or inaccurate information. As well, letters can only be printed as space allows. Please keep your letters brief and concise.