Lately I have been confused by the reactions of fellow Newfies (yes I use the N-word) to articles in the news. First of all, I was not really surprised when Premier Danny Williams got overwhelming support for standing up to Stephen Harper on commitments related to the Atlantic Accord. Why wouldn’t he? Last time he took on the (former) PM on this issue, he won, and we expect the same thing this time.

However, at the same time this story plays out, the Premier (and his Government) is being flogged from all sides for a new branding campaign for the Province. The first complaint was one you expect whenever any government makes a decision, the cost. The Opposition and other groups felt the million dollars could have gone elsewhere, like propping up outport communities on hard times. Though I feel some of these complaints are short sited, I not going to argue them here because it was the second reaction that took me by surprise and lead to my confusion.

You see, the new brand is a stylized version of the words “Newfoundland” and “Labrador” along with a Pitcher Plant, our Provincial flower. In explaining the symbol and how it relates to the people of this province, the literature sent to residents includes text such as, “Because we can’t help but smile at something that lives on a rock, where nothing else grows.” (Cue the criticism…)

When the one of the local newscasts ask for comments on the topic, amongst other things, people complain about the reference. Most of which boiled down to, “why would you want to portray the Province in such a way.” And it’s not only call to the broadcast that have projected this distaste; I have heard it form others both in conversation on the topic, and in passing references.

This is where I start to get confused. Since I can remember I have always here stories about how Newfoundlanders are a strong, hearty people. We had to be! Our ancestors inhabited a fierce and unforgiving land to take on one of the worlds most dangerous professions (especially in those times), fishing. We built communities on the sides of cliffs, just to take advantage of sheltered harbour below. Quite literally growing a community where nothing else would grow.

Not only did we live this way, we were once proud of it. We passed stories and sang songs about the hardship and how our people overcame it all. Lately though, we seem to have lost this sense of pride. We haven’t stopped singing the songs or telling the stories, but it would seem we stopped listening to them. Then we started to hear what a few loud voices in the rest of Canada had to say, and we were ashamed.

Yes, it would seem that Newfoundlanders have the pride and conviction to stand up with our Premier for what we believe is right for our future. What we need to get back now is the pride in our past. With this complete identity, we can more forward, and knowing what our people have gone though thus far, we won’t be afraid of anything the future might hold.

It happened, my first spam comment on my blog. What surprises me though is it was not from a bot, it was a real person. And worse, it was from a politician trying to further his cause. Last night Stephen Eli Harris made his was around the intricate web of interlinked blogs of my friends and family (as well as their friends and family), commenting on the most recent posting and in doing so, left a link to his Green Party blog.

If you know me, you know that I have many opinions, and most of them are political. For many years, following politics has been a favorite hobby of mine. Early on though, I made a decision not to make my blog a politician forum (well not in the party politics sense). I did not think I had the time or the energy to write and defend my many political views. It seems though that politics has found its way to my blog.

I’m am not sure the purpose of Mr. Harris’ comment spamming, maybe it was just to drum up traffic to his site, or maybe to up his page rank on search sites. What I am sure of is that I do not approve of the scheme. I have no problem with anyone adding a comment to my blog (as long as it is not offensive). I am especially happy when I found I have reached someone new in the world. However, using my blog (or that of anyone else) to forward a cause without the owners permission is not acceptable.

(Note: I believe that this was the purposes of the comments, as logs show that Mr. Harris visited many sites and only left comments on ones of those in Newfoundland.)

As soon as I finish this entry, I will be emailing Mr. Harris to ask him to refrain from continuing this practice, and remove the link to my blog that now resides on his site (as to me it implies an endorsement of sorts). Unfortunately, I am now forced to turn on the approval of all comments to end this practice on my site. And from now on, or at least until the time I see fit to change my policy, I will try to keep this site free of party politics.

I don’t know when it happened, but I’ve notice recently that the customer has gone from always being right, to being the unwanted. At one time they would even entertain you until they got your money, but these days it seems like that don’t even want to put the effort into selling. Maybe assuming someone else will come and not ask some many questions before buying.

A couple weeks ago, I though I might actually upgrade my net connection. Maybe get the new “Ultra High Speed” package. So, after calling my ISP (the local telco Aliant) around 7:30pm, and getting a recording, I though I would inquire at there store in the mall.

When I got there the first thing I asked was if they could tell me the details of my current package. “I’m sorry, we can tell you that, we’re not an Aliant store,” the man told me. I found this to be a remarkable answer. The only signs visible in the entire store said “Aliant.” I decide to let it go though and pressed on. When I asked if he could tell me the details of there current offering, his answer was again useless: “You can find all the information online.”

At this point I was ready to leave. So with a terse , “k,” I left the store and went to see a movie. What annoys me though, is for him it was mission accomplished. I was another person to be served by the web so he won’t have to. At that point I decided, if I couldn’t talk to someone about what I wanted, I could do without. I only wish he and all the other “service” people out there could see the lost sale so that maybe the customer could be “right” again.

Ban election signs you say??? But how will we know who to vote for???

I been noticing lately that some local elections here in Newfoundland seem to be more about the number of election signs you have, and less about your platform. On one street on my drive to work in the morning, some candidates have a sign every 10 feet. Is there a need? Do they think we are all slow readers and will not have time to read the text with only one sign?

You might argue that this is part of the election process, but some of these potential consellors have not even sent out a platform to the electorate yet. They have spent more time defining their campaign colour than their ideas? Do we really want people running our towns, provinces and countries based on the number of election signs they can afford?

Last night was the last straw for me. I came home to find the sign of a candidate on my lawn. I have a stop sign on the corner of my lot, and I assume workers for the cadidate thought it was fair game and strapped a sign to it. Only there are a couple problems with this:

1) I did not approve the plcement of the sign on my lawn.
2) Attaching election signs to municiple signage is illegal according to my city’s by-laws.

Here in lies the problem: who is going to police the use of election signs? Is it reasonable to expect the people who depend on them to get elected without requiring any vision or qualifications? Seeing as how many of them do not even follow the current rules, why would we expect them to create more restrictive ones?

What we need is a collect push as the voting public. If all those who are annoyed by the site ugly, uninformative election signs (and I know there are lots of you out there) were to band together, the politicians would have to listen. So the next time a candidate comes to you door, ask them to explain why they need need so many signs? When they cannot explain, ask them if they would support banning/limiting them? If enough of us do, it is bound to catch on.

By the title you would think I am writing about just one topic, but not so. I decided I wanted to combine two of my favorite topics, Politics and Movies.

If you have seen a Canada (or even American thanks to “Captain Ed”) channel over the last while, you most likely have heard something about “AdScam.” Well today my mind started wandering (like it does) to some comments made by a former classmate a few years ago who stated that it was no use voting, “because they’ll all be the same.” At the time I tried arguing, but now I not sure if I would.

AdScam focuses on what happened to millions of dollars doled out by our government to firms with strong ties to the governing party. Thus far, prevailing opinion seem to believe that some was kept by the ad firms, and some lined the pockets of the party dishing it out (I stress this is just opinion and not proven, though it does make sense). Now it seems that another political party in Quebec may have been doing the same.
No wonder the youth of our country do not bother to vote. How can they have faith in the institution of government? I’m sure Canada will get out from under this political black cloud, but until we do, we should expect voter apathy to remain high. I mean really, I’m an avid follower of politics and even I find this shakes my faith in my vote.

On a lighter not I saw a refreshing different movie last night, Sin City. Lately, I have been used to Hollywood churning out the same old boilerplate movies (these are the people who remade Ocean’s 11 and then decided it needed a sequel). Sin City however is like nothing I have seen in a long time, if at all. The movie sticks very close to its graphic novel roots, presenting the story almost entirely in B&W and using monologue to drive the story (though without the little square boxes ). It is a little violent, but not real enough to be disturbing. I you are a fan on comics, I suggest you see this movie. If you want something new in a cinematic experience, I suggest this movie. Hell, I suggest this movie.