David T. Joneshttp://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/author/20enghttp://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/1047http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/1047 The U.S. decision to defer decision on the Keystone XL pipeline has tossed an eagle into the dovecot.  A “no brainer” decision regarding the merits of providing secure energy (as well as j-o-b-s) has apparently been adroitly manipulated by the brainless. Consequently, the State Department disclaimer that the delay decision was not “political” is disingenuous at best; it passes neither the sniff nor the giggle test.  After years of review, acres of trees slaughtered in written testimony, and scads of let-it-all-hang-out public hearings, the State Department announced that there were no environmental objections to the pipeline.  Subsequently, President Obama said that he would make the decision—retrospectively a fatal blow to any near term decision.  David T. JonesFri, 16 Dec 2011 20:00:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/1057http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/1057 One of the enduring elements of Canadian psychic angst is the status of its First Nations.   Over the years, indeed over the decades, an observer can recall the viewing-with-alarm and/or dismay that affect Canadians when one or another instance of ghetto in the woods associated with a First Nation reserve comes to light. David T. JonesFri, 16 Dec 2011 15:30:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/1039http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/1039 "Who You Are Is Where You Were When" ~ Morris Massey The quotation refers to the events that define you and your generation—life and history altering episodes that are the benchmarks for memory and the iron pole around which your future swingsand conditions your thinking.  For my parents, it was Pearl Harbor.  For me, it was the JFK assassination.  For my children (and for me again), it has been 9/11. David T. JonesWed, 26 Oct 2011 19:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/1015http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/1015Washington, DC - All human rights organizations are imperious; didactic; and self-righteous.  They perceive their role as afflicting the comfortable and belaboring malefactors whose sins of omission as well as commission demand vitriolic criticism.  Amnesty International (AI) is a human rights organization and by definition seeks to criticize:  the mote in your eye gets the same intense condemnation as the beam in the eye of another offender.David T. JonesFri, 26 Aug 2011 22:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/970http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/970 Washington, DC - So Florida-based pastor Terry Jones is back for another bite at the 15-minutes-of-fame apple.This time, however, the consequences of his campaign against the Qur'an has had fatal effects.  His largely unremarked "trial" and "execution" by burning of a Qur'an occurred almost completely without notice in North America.  One assumes that this lack of media attention in the United States/Canada was deliberate (one 15 minutes of fame per eccentric claimant) with the appreciation that publicity could have invidious effect. David T. JonesThu, 21 Apr 2011 21:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/942http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/942On December 22, 2010, the Senate having spent much time wailing and gnashing teeth approved the New START Treaty with Russia.  From the language, one could have thought its advocates believed it to be the arms control's Second Coming (or at least a much accelerated new millennium) while its opponents characterized it as a cup of hemlock for the Republic.David T. JonesWed, 16 Feb 2011 18:00:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/904http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/904Washington, DC - The Republican Party, having won a substantial victory in the November 2 election, is about to encounter that existential challenge.  Be careful of what you ask for; you may get it.David T. JonesMon, 27 Dec 2010 21:00:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/926http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/926It seems like forever; it seems like only yesterday that I first encountered David and Diana Nicholson and enjoyed a "Wednesday Night."  In the winter of 1993, I was political minister counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Ottawa, and I attended this first Night as "spouse of" my wife Teresa who was the economic/commercial officer at the U.S. consulate in Montreal.David T. JonesMon, 27 Dec 2010 11:30:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/890http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/890  This is the time of "spin." The Democrats sound as if they were victims of an IED blast, delighted to have only lost an arm and a leg instead of two of each.  The Republicans sound like roosters believing that the sun rose because they crowed.The reality check is more complex.  The Democrats were sharply defeated, losing the House of Representatives, but not as catastrophically as was predicted earlier in the summer.  And, they retained control of the Senate, saving their vulnerable majority leader Harry Reid.  Moreover, Democrats gained a great, oft unmentioned prize:  the governorship of California, which will assist them substantially in the 2012 presidential election.  David T. JonesThu, 04 Nov 2010 15:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/892http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/892 After nine years of carefully navigating between the Scylla of global revenge against the Muslim world for 9/11 and the Charybdis of insisting Islam is inherently peaceful with the 9/11 terrorists depicted as nonreligious miscreants, we have gone aground.  Americans are now impaled on the Constitutional imperative of First Amendment "free speech"-- which we have made even more a national shibboleth than the right to bear arms.  Over the years, it has mattered not that many other countries have scuttled free speech and/or neutered it in practice (if it might be interpreted as "hate speech," it must be foregone or punished).  We have exulted in discord. David T. JonesThu, 04 Nov 2010 13:30:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/831http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/831As a truth in writing caveat, one must admit up front that Washington is paying no attention to Quebec.  It barely pays attention to Canada (except during this time of year as a possible destination for a vacation/fishing trip); it notices Quebec only when the province is in extremis:  in the throes of a "tear the country apart" referendum or, perhaps, with a dramatic winter storm with great media visuals of marching files of ice-toppled hydroelectric towers.David T. JonesThu, 10 Jun 2010 10:30:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/810http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/810Washington, DC - Having just returned from a Middle East trip that included travel in Israel, I am prompted to muse over the current imbroglio roiling U.S.-Israeli relations.  Over the past several weeks, there has been renewed incentive to fault find Israel for offenses that sometimes more in the mind of the beholder than in reality.  Indeed, it is far easier to find unloving critics than uncritical lovers in the current environment.  For example, the tour group with which I traveled had two briefers:  An articulate representative of the Palestinian Authority who (predictably) found fault with all elements of Israeli policy and an Israeli from a local NGO who was also critical of the GOI.  But the absence of "balance" went unremarked.David T. JonesFri, 23 Apr 2010 19:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/771http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/771Washington, DC…Even before the seminal January 12 earthquake, Haiti was in trouble.  It was the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere with per capita income of less than $2 per day ($660/year) where 1 percent of the citizens held half of Haiti's wealth.  Even before the earthquake, statistics indicated that only a third of the population could access electricity and only 11 percent had piped water.  No city had a sanitation system; life expectancy at 61 years was the hemisphere's lowest, and the UN Human Development Index placed it 149 of 182 countries with all below it being African states.  The best and brightest of its citizens long ago escaped...David T. JonesThu, 11 Feb 2010 17:00:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/749http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/749 There is an aphorism to the effect that you can always make a sensitive person feel guilty. Extrapolate that judgment to a national level and one can conclude that Canada is so afflicted.There is much wrong, indeed evil, that is done in the world that we can do nothing to mitigate, let alone eliminate.   To paraphrase scripture, too often “we do those things that we ought not to have done and leave undone those things that we ought to have done.”  We cudgel ourselves with “what ifs.”   If we had only paid more attention; worked harder; spoken out; saved more/spent less, the wrong would be righted (or would never have happened at all). David T. JonesThu, 07 Jan 2010 18:00:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/733http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/733It was a cold, wet, and grim Remembrance/Veterans Day in Washington this year.  Perhaps more than even in the most recent past, moods were irritated, marked by a puzzled frustration over the future of the United States and the most effective manner of management for a multiracial/multicultural/multi-multi society...David T. JonesThu, 03 Dec 2009 18:30:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/714http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/714On Tuesday, November 3, as a resident of Arlington Virginia, I voted.  As I did so, I recalled that Canadian friends had voted earlier in the week in Montreal for mayor and council members.  On my ballot were candidates for governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, and a variety of state and county officials, e.g., school board.  For a variety of personal and institutional reasons, this was the first time I’d ever voted in Arlington, having participated by absentee ballot for 45 years in my home town, Scranton, Pennsylvania.  But now I was exercising my franchise where I live; it was a privilege to do so freely and one about which I am not blasé. David T. JonesWed, 04 Nov 2009 17:30:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/678http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/678 This summer for Americans has seen the return of the “teachable moment.”  That is, in my rough definition of such, a circumstance or development from which a lesson about life, society, politics, etc can be drawn. Our interlock in this instance, has been the interaction between Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates (an African American), Cambridge police sergeant James Crowley (a Caucasian), and U.S. President Barack Obama.  Although the outlines of this event are relatively well known, they deserve recounting. David T. JonesWed, 02 Sep 2009 10:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/638http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/638 What was I missing?  What was it that I didn‘t understand?The continuing saga of Abousfian Abdelrazik, marooned in the Canadian embassy in Khartoum for over a year, had a “Kafkaesque Catch 22” quality to it that sounds more like the opening scene of some comedy/suspense thriller than a “we’re telling you this with a straight face” diplomatic explanation.  Even with his return it leaves an outside observer head shaking... David T. JonesThu, 02 Jul 2009 13:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/576http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/576We can be confident that, as soon as our long ago ancestors started living in caves, there was "correctness"--social, political, tribal, etc.  Just where do you throw your bones after cracking them open and sucking out the marrow?  Just where do you perform your bodily functions?  Or who speaks (grunts?) in what order in the group meeting?David T. JonesThu, 18 Jun 2009 19:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/577http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/577There are basic needs for human beings:  the obvious are food; shelter; sex.  And then it becomes complicated for societies where the basics are “givens,” and needs become more abstract.  Are the freedoms enumerated in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms (and the U.S. Constitution) “freedoms”—or limitations on the actions that a citizen might take otherwise?David T. JonesThu, 18 Jun 2009 18:45:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/548http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/548 Washington, DC - There are basic needs for human beings:  the obvious are food; shelter; sex.  And then it becomes complicated for societies where the basics are “givens,” and needs become more abstract.  Are the freedoms enumerated in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms (and the U.S. Constitution) “freedoms”—or limitations on the actions that a citizen might take otherwise? Freedom of speech—but at what point does it become slander?Freedom of the press—but what are the parameters of libel, let alone “hate” when making such speech?Freedom of religion—but to practice polygamy, let alone human sacrifice? David T. JonesThu, 28 May 2009 13:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/513http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/513It is a pity that political correctness has driven Mark Twain out of style.  A generation ago, Samuel Clemens (whose nom de plume was “Mark Twain”) was both an iconic author of children’s stories (Tom Sawyer, Prince and the Pauper) and regarded as one of the “greats” in American literature for the classic Huckleberry Finn.  Although “Tom” and “Huck” were often presented as a duality of “boys’ stories,” Huck was anything but a child’s tale with its sophisticated story of adult duplicity and mendacity along with Huck’s efforts to get a slave friend, “Jim” to safety...David T. JonesThu, 09 Apr 2009 09:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/490http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/490The contretemps over the now aborted recreation of the battle on the Plains of Abraham demonstrates this reality...David T. JonesThu, 19 Mar 2009 15:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/455http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/455It must be tedious and frustrating to be a "concerned Canadian."  So many errors to be corrected; so many problems to be resolved; so many wrong directions to be set straight...David T. JonesThu, 26 Feb 2009 13:00:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/444http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/444One of life's lessons is that no man stands so tall as when he puts the monkey on some one else's back.  Appreciating that sobriquet, "Bush 43" jets into history (or at least to Crawford Texas), and a chattering troop of simians have seated themselves on President Obama's shoulders. Caging them, throttling them, or just enduring them are now the Democrats problem as for the first time since 1992, the Democrats control both the Congress and the Presidency...David T. JonesThu, 05 Feb 2009 05:30:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/379http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/379We can be confident that, as soon as our long ago ancestors started living in caves, there was "correctness"--social, political, tribal, etc.  Just where do you throw your bones after cracking them open and sucking out the marrow?  Just where do you perform your bodily functions?  Or who speaks (grunts?) in what order in the group meeting?..David T. JonesThu, 15 Jan 2009 09:00:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/108http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/108Washington DC  - Washington media has much bruited about the concept of a “team of rivals” for the Obama administration.  The label derives from the Doris Kearns Goodwin book of the same name regarding Abraham Lincoln’s assembly of a Civil War cabinet incorporating his political rivals, who individually and corporately believed themselves far better qualified than he to lead the country under any circumstances, let alone during a civil war..David T. JonesThu, 18 Dec 2008 17:00:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/123http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/123Journalists are inclined to depict every political bend in the road as a major turning point.  Historians know better.  And so it is after the 2008 election in which President-elect Obama is being globally greeted with hosannas and depicted as the bearer of solutions to all ills foreign and domestic. ..David T. JonesThu, 27 Nov 2008 15:00:00 -0500http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/397http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/397 U.S. observers of the Canadian scene are well aware of the almost obsessive attention Canadians pay to the United States. It is almost as if you don't have a life of your own... David T. JonesThu, 30 Oct 2008 19:00:00 -0400http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/194http://www.themetropolitain.ca/articles/view/194 A kirpan is a kirpan is … a knife. A kirpan wrapped up and under the clothing of the owner is … a concealed weapon.,, David T. JonesThu, 16 Oct 2008 05:00:00 -0400