Revolting

With the HST coming to Ontario and BC, a major revolt seems to be underway west of the Rockies. This is what makes BC politics so much fun to watch: the revolt is being spearheaded by former premier Bill Vander Zalm.

The main argument made FOR the tax is that it will streamline reporting and save businesses money. Fair enough, I suppose, but here's the majority sentiment.

First, Gordon Campbell lied. During a recent election campaign he clearly said that this tax harmonization wasn't in future plans. Mere months later, here we are. I don't want to come across as excessively naive in reminding readers that Campbell lied, after all, this IS Canadian politics....

So let's move to point # 2. This HST will basically increase taxes on many goods and services from 5% (or in some cases, 7%) to 12%. End of point.

Supporters and economists make comforting noises about how reduced costs to businesses will trickle down to consumers (eventually). Since this IS Canada, I'm guessing that most people in BC are just a wee bit skeptical about this claim. Believing in lower prices (and, indeed, lower taxes) is akin to having faith in the tooth fairy.

Government 0, Democracy 1

The Speaker in the House of Commons has today ordered the Government to hand over documents related to the Afghan detainee issue, saying that it is Parliament that is the final authority in these matters.

The government has been refusing to hand over uncensored documents claiming national security concerns. The cynics among us have been unconvinced, suspecting that the government is hiding something.

This decision strikes a blow to the kind of autocracy the current occupant of the Prime Minister's Office would dearly like to have. Let's not stop with this small victory but go on to take back real democracy for Canadians and their elected representatives.

To Hell('s Canyon) and Back

We just got back from a week wandering around eastern Washington and NE Oregon, with the main aim of having a look at Hell's Canyon.

Hell's Canyon is a stretch of the Snake River on the border between Oregon and Idaho. As the name might imply, it's a rather impressive canyon, deeper than the Grand Canyon at it's deepest, although not as wide or nearly as, ummm, grand, in our opinions.

We were unable to see that particular part of the Canyon because it's further downstream from the area in the photo and is visible only from an overlook that was closed because of lingering winter snow.

Speaking of that, we were turned back a total of 3 times from routes we had chosen because of snow-blocked roads. We were somewhat surprised - it was pretty much full-on spring/summer down there, with trees in bloom and flowers bursting out all over. And, in most of these road closures, not a word about the snow until we actually got to where the snow still was.

That said, it was a fine trip and we spent a couple of days following the Columbia River down along Lake Roosevelt, Grand Coulée Dam, the Columbia River Gorge about an hour east of Portland and to some of the high country in NE Oregon such as the Blue Mountains. We walked around a couple of nice waterfalls (Palousie Falls in WA and Multnomah Falls in Oregon) and admired lots of spring flowers. And then we got to come back home where spring is finally starting to take off.

Game On

I just finished listening to the podcast of CBC Radio's Spark, show # 108, from April 4th. The main feature was an interview with Jesse Schell about the current state of video (and other) games and the future of games. I found the interview very interesting and would recommend anyone even remotely curious about the topic of games to have a listen. You can hear the full interview by following a link here.

Jesse had a lot to say about various types of games, especially the ones many play on Facebook. He also had some comments about how businesses could make (or are already making) use of gaming psychology in their advertising.

I have to confess that I've never been much of a computer or video game aficionado. In fact, the only game I can recall playing much of was years ago on old Apple II computers, something called Loderunner. It had a joystick. Wow, eh?

The full interview is rather lengthy but it's worth having a listen, even if you do suffer from ADD. Try to focus for the 45 minutes that it takes ;-)

Owls in the Family?

For the past couple of weeks now, we've been hearing a small owl in the woods near our house. Pictures have not been possible, but this is what they look like. It's a Northern Saw-Whet Owl, identified by it's call, a continuous series of hoots: too too too too too too too too and so on.

The other night I went out to see if I could catch a glimpse of the little bird. I wandered around in the woods listening and watching, but as I moved one way, the hooting moved the other way. We kept this game up for awhile until I got cold.

Soon after going back inside, I also heard the local coyotes yipping down in the woods along with the owl hooting. Night life in the Kootenays.