HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2002-10-16, Page 5Final Thought
To promise not to do a thing is the surest
way in the world to make a body want to go ,
and do that very thing.
Mark Ttt'ain
THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2002. PAGE 5.
Other Views
They're playing the circle game
1don't suppose I'll ever be interviewed by
The National Enquirer. Too supernaturally
deprived. I have never talked to an
extraterrestrial, been kidnapped by aliens, or
marveled at strange and inexplicable
spacecraft streaking across the sky.
But I have seen crop circles. In a farmer's
field near Vanderhoof, a small town in the B.C.
interior.
They were crop circles, alright. A good
hundred feet in diameter. No sign of footprints,
tire tracks or mechanical interference — just a
series of circular depressions in which the
wheat stalks had all been flattened in the same
direction, as if by a giant steam iron.
What was it — a message from E.T.?
Not necessarily. _
Crop circles are- a . misnomer for the
phenomena /hat appear to paralyze Mel
Gibson in the movie Signs.
A better name would be Crock Circles.
They first gained public attention back in the
1960s, when farmers in the south of England
began to notice strange areas of flattened grain
in their fields. The fact that these fields were
not far from the ancient Druid site of
Stonehenge jacked up the Twilight Zone factor
right from the get-go.
Before long the circles were appearing in
grain fields in " continental Europe, then in
Japan, Canada and the U.S.
They all shared some common
characteristics: the circles were big, of varying
complexity. with no sign of human
participation.
And they always appeared overnight.
- Theories were legion. Scientific types
reckoned they were caused by rogue-
windstorms. Or maybe a plasma vortex of
electronic force fields. Or perhaps
geomagnetic currents from deep inside the
Fi rnie Eves would be doing a lot better if
it were not for Mike Harris. The former
Progressive Conservative premier has
left problems that keep emerging and hurting
his successor six months after he moved on.
The most recent was a revelation that Harris,
only days before he retired and without telling
anyone but a handful of compliant ministers,
gave overpaid professional sports teams a
massive tax cut despite having reduced
services for the needy.
Eves had been unaware of Harris's tax break
and will cancel it. But Harris has started a
career with a law firm connected to sports
teams.
His generosity gave the Liberals an opening
to charge that Tories who govern favour their
friends and much of the public will remember
it simply as Tories secretly giving a tax break
to the rich.
Eves a few days earlier fired his tourism
minister, Cam Jackson, for treating himself at
taxpayers' expense to good wines, fine dining,
fancy hotel rooms and other high living.
Many ministers have spent public money
freely on themselves and the abuse has to be
exceptional before one is fired.
Jackson did his spending while Harris was
premier, was doing nothing to stop it, and was
even encouraging it by allowing others in
public service, including officers of its
electricity transmission network, Hydro One, .
to
,
oVeispend. But it still probably will be
thought of as_a minister fired for feeding too
much at the public trough on Eves'S' watch.
Eves had to rebuke two other ministers,
Chris Stockwell and John Baird, and a former,
minister, Rob Sampson, and their staffs for
charging high expenses.
Arthur
Black
earth were responsible.
More mystical observers saw them as calling
cards from aliens eager to communicate with
earthlings.
Actually, what it was, was Doug and Dave.
Doug Bower and Dave Chorley, two good
old boys who liked to knock back a few brews
of an evening in a pub in Wiltshire, not far
from Stonehenge.
One Friday night back in 1978 after last call,
Doug and Dave decided to have a bit of fun.
They grabbed some rope and a few planks and
headed out to a nearby farm.
The next morning, a Wiltshire farmer was
scratching his head and wondering what the
hell had happened to his barley crop overnight.
For the next dozen years, Doug and Daye
spent a couple of nights each week visiting
farmers' fields under cover of darkness. They
reckon that between 1978 and 1991 they
created over 1,000 crop circles in the
Stonehenge area. _
A British newspaper reporter said "Not so
fast" and challenged the two to prove their
story. They took the reporter out with them the
following night. She watched as they tip-toed
into a field between the plants and set up a pole
with a string attached to the top. Then they
grabbed the opposite end of the rope and began
walking — Hey, presto — a crop circle.
Then they used the wooden planks to flatten
the grain within the perimeter they'd created.
Eves also had to face a grilling over a fifth
minister, Tony Clement, paying an Enron-like
$300,000-a-year salary to an aide. But all the
ministers' overspending took place under
Harris, who turned a benevolent blind eye.
The issue Harris left that has given Eves the
biggest headache has been his last-minute,
poorly-prepared decision to sell. Hydro One.
Harris, a disciple of Margaret Thatcher, had
been premier nearly seven years and largely
backed off his initial, grandiose plans for
privatizating government functions when he
announced suddenly the province would sell
its electricity transmission network.
Harris left his successor to carry this
through, but failed to make sure first the
province had legal authority to sell and initiate
a public debate in which he could have tried to
whip up support for privatizing.
A court ruled the province did not have the
right to sell and the need to pass 'new
legislation gave the opposition parties time to
rally public concern.
Senior officers of the utility were then found
raking in huge salaries, and perks for
limousines, memberships in private clubs and
sponsorship of an ocean-going racing yacht
unheard of in government, which Harris also
had failed to stop.
It looked good, but the reporter still wasn't
convinced. The following day, she brought in
one of Britain's top crop circle researchers and
asked him whether he thought the creation was
authentic.
The expert's assessment? "No human being
could have done this. These crops are laid
down in• these sensational patterns by an
energy that remains unexplained and is of a
high level of intelligence."
So are Doug and Dave responsible for the
thousands of crop circles that have appeared
from Valladolid to Vanderhoof? Of course not.
But 90 per cent of all reported crop circles in
the world have appeared within 50 miles of
Stonehenge. As for the ones Doug and Dave
didn't do, — the experts chalk them up to
copycats.
Which experts? Carl Sagan, for one. The
famous U.S.-astronomer (and tireless searcher
for extraterrestrial life) concluded years ago
that crop circles were an utter hoax.
And the Committee for the Scientific
Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal
reports: "Approximately 100 per cent of crop
circles are man-made. We say approximately
because we have to- allow for dogs chasing
their tails and other phenomena."
As for my Vanderhoof crop circles - they
looked authentic.to me, but I'm not an expert
in the field.
I do know a thing or two about human
nature, though - and there was something a
little 'off' about the guy I talked to who
reported the find. Nothing big - just a little
sideways sashay of the eyeballs as he talked
with a credulous gaggle of reporters about how
'shocked and amazed' he was by his discovery.
He was saying all the right words, but he
struck me as a guy with a great story he
couldn't wait to spill down at the local pub.
Eves had to cut the salaries and perks
and fire officials who took them and was
forced by public outrage into one of the most
dramatic retreats in memory when he agreed to
sell only a minority interest, but it can all bt.
traced back to Harris's miscalculations.
Eves has to take some responsibility for
what an earlier Tory premier did because
he is in the same party and many voters
will feel what Tories did once they may do
again.
Eves has to persuade them he will be
different. He cannot issue a disclaimer saying
he is in no way liable for the deeds of his
predecessor, with whom he says he remains on
cordial personal terms.
But Eves has had bad luck in having an
unusually large number of continuing
problems bequeathed to him by Harris.
The only remotely comparable situation was
when Tory premier William Davis nearly two
decades ago ignored opposition in his party
and announced -full provincial funding for
Catholic high schools.
That decision helped his successor, Frank
Miller, get tossed out of office and Eves has to
worry a departing premier could hurt a
successor again.
Just be thankful
Rest and be thankful. — Inscription on
stone seat in the Scottish Highlands
and title of one of Wordsworth's poems.
Grumbling, growling, worrying, stewing.
We've come to do it so well it's not always
easy, despite our best efforts, to remember we
really don't have all that much to complain
about.
Fortunately, there is at least one weekend a
year when looking on the bright side is not just
a suggestion, it's the purpose. This past
weekend was our opportunity to rest and be
thankful.
A houseful of family has always lightened
, the day for me. Busy, noisy, and many, their
presence makes it pretty difficult for me not to
see how fortunate I am.
And at Thanksgiving my accommodating
children have humoured this sappy mother
year after year with their reasons for being
thankful. Amidst groans of reluctance they
abashedly note the many things for which they
are thankful, simply because they know it's
important to. me.
Completely unmoved by any protestations
for such a mushy observance, I am not the
least bit ashamed to say I enjoy a good deal of
satisfaction over their pronouncements. As
siblings can be, so quick to throw the punches,
I feel, saccaharine-sweet overdose of
sentimentality aside, it doesn't hurt them to
tell others and remind themselves just how
darn good they have it. Health, comfort and
each other have been a constant in their lives
and sharing a little positive vibe has never hurt
anyone.
After all being positive is what
Thanksgiving is about: Not many of us own
the world, but with the state it's in lately, who
would want to? And if we're smart we're
certainly grateful for the cozy little speck f,f it
we do own.
Cash flow for the fortunate majority might
not be heavy, but it's steady And while we
may be fighting gravity and time, we're still
breathing.
Give it some real thought and you'd have to
see that the glass is indeed half lull. And for
this be thankful.
Unfortunately, it often appears that
optimism is a relative point. In the right place
at the right time, with things going well under
the right circumstances life is good. It's easy to
see the bright side.
But when things keep going from bad to
worse it takes someone with true heart to find
the sanity amidst the madness, the sun behind
the clouds, the music in chaos. {
Oh, you can remind yourself that it could be
worse, but when the soul hurts that can be a
pretty ineffective balm.
What I have found with families, or any
large gathering for that matter, is that there is
generally - someone who can put it all into
perspective, the true optimist whose sunny
smile can beam you out of the doldrums.
Which person this is may change*from time to
time, but generally there is at least one to be
the angel on the shoulder.
Add to this the sentiment of Thanksgiving
and it should be a statutory holiday from
cynicism and pessimism.
Gathering together for the Thanksgiving
least, families can take the time together to
consider their blessings. And with this
reflection done en masse, even the most
disgruntled curmudgeon at the table should be
able to agree on some levet .
Harris legacy harmful to Eves