When I was young, we sometimes went to the Saturday movies. In those days, the theatre didn’t consider the main feature sufficient to attract an audience, so they ran a weekly serial as well. In flickering black-and-white, we kids watched the Lone Ranger solve crimes, kill bad guys, rescue beautiful maidens, and round up rustled cattle.
The serial always ended with what we called a “cliffhanger.” The hero – or the unfortunate heroine waiting to be rescued – faced almost certain death. The train thundered towards the victim. The snake prepared to strike. The bad guy got his gun out first.
The “cliffhanger” term comes from the most cliché-ed of endings – the hero hung over the edge of a bottomless cliff, clinging to a tiny shrub. The shrub’s roots were pulling loose; the hero’s fingers were loosening; the villain’s boots were nearing.
Of course, we had to come back, next Saturday, we just had to, to see how this crisis resolved itself.
The makers of those old flicks never built a cliffhanger around a democratic election. But that’s what we have, currently, in B.C.
The voting on Tuesday, May 9, left the outcome hanging. As of Wednesday morning, the previous Liberal government of Premier Christy Clark was one seat short of a majority. The opposition NDP was three seats short of a majority. And the upstart Green party held those three seats that both of the traditional parties needed to form a majority government.
You can bet that a lot of lobbying was going on behind closed doors. And closed lips.
To add to the tension, several seats were decided by a margin of just a handful of votes. Recounts could take another two weeks. And absentee ballots still had to be counted.
So we hang. Over a cliff. Fingernails digging into the dirt. Waiting for the next installment.
The conservative model
I blame Donald Trump for the Liberal losses. Because the Liberals really aren’t liberal, they’re right-wing conservatives hiding behind a shining smile.
Granted, I blame Donald Trump for almost anything these days. But seriously, I think Trump’s election as U.S. president has exposed the rot at the root of all right-wing politics. It has a “me first” agenda. Me first, and the hell with you.
At the national scale, that translates into America first. It’s got to be good for America. If that hurts you, too bad, buddy – you shoulda been American, like us.
At the personal scale, it means my job, my values, my faith -- and don’t threaten any of those. By working under the counter. By belonging to a different religion. By questioning anything I hold dear.
Trump’s choices for his administration all reveal one common characteristic – an obsession with feathering the financial and ideological nests of their own kin and class, regardless of the fallout on the less fortunate.
The less fortunate simply don’t count, don’t matter, in a “me first” economy. They have less money to contribute to the economy. Therefore they have less power.
The ideological foundation of the far right is built on closeness to me. My cronies. My profits. My stock markets.
Even one’s own great-grandchildren are too far away in the future to receive serious consideration. So what if the world is unlivable by their time? They’re not here now, are they?
Guilt by association
In France, in Holland, the right-wing parties thought they could ride Trump’s coattails to power. Why not? Didn’t their anti-immigrant, anti-government, policies mirror the same anger that propelled him to power?
From my perspective, though, those policies associated them with a personality most people detested and distrusted.
Here in B.C., NDP leader John Horgan’s most effective criticisms involved Premier Christy Clark’s (supposed) friendships with the privileged inhabitants of corporate boardrooms. “She gave billions to her friends,” Horgan charged, “and now she wants to take an extra thousand dollars from you.”
Ancient Greek tragedies used something called a “deus ex machina” – a god-figure lowered onto the stage or raised up through a trapdoor – to resolve cliffhanger situations where the hero seems to have “painted himself into a corner,” as Wikipedia puts it.
So as the voting stands right now, Andrew Weaver and his upstart Green Party have become our “deus ex machina.” He holds the balance of power.
To continue the movie serial analogy, Weaver can decide whether to sacrifice the maiden lashed to the railway tracks. Or to doom the unionized work-crew trying to fix the siding.
His boots are made for stomping. I can’t wait to see whose fingers he chooses to stomp on.
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Copyright © 2017 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups encouraged; links from other blogs welcomed; all other rights reserved.
To send comments, to subscribe, or to unsubscribe, write jimt@quixotic.ca
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YOUR TURN
Bob Rollwagen called last week’s column about grug costs “Another bulls eye. Ontario is about to make another step in the right direction. Unfortunately, south of us, the citizens of Rome have been duped again as their nation continues to crumble.
“I think that you will see that using the new drug has a much smaller net cost to us [than present practices]. Add in the improved family life and all other related costs the family bears, and you begin to uncover how short sighted our leaders are.”
Tom Watson commented, “Your question ‘Who decides what a life is worth?’ is a cogent one. From health care debates I've recently noted, it would appear that it's a simple answer: leave it to the free market. Given the ability to compete and adjust health insurance premiums accordingly, the insurance companies will make it so that everybody gets the health care they deserve.
“Everybody, that is, except those who can't afford to pay the premiums.
“The question for the insurance company isn't ‘How much is a life worth?’ It's "How do we maximize profits?’ No reference to common humanity is required there.
“When government officials make the decisions about what is funded and what isn't, the question shifts just slightly to ‘How do we manage scarce resources?’ And that seems always to be the case when determining how best to spend taxation dollars. It would be interesting to sit around the table during a discussion among bureaucrats as to what medication or what procedure gets funded and what ones are cut off, or perhaps funded only under certain conditions, or only so many of a particular procedure can be funded in a given year. Again, no reference to common humanity is required; it's not a matter of human health, rather it's a matter of economics.”
Laurna Tallman also had some harsh words for drug companies: “How poignantly you write about the special needs of people living on the frontiers of medical ignorance… You must relive the heartbreak of your son's illness and death as you turn your attention to this scientific breakthrough.
Laurna wrote about two instances of medication failure, one to a friend, another to a family member. “I was blinded by my indoctrination into ‘respect’ for the medical profession and disdain for my own ability to think about what I was seeing every single day. Ten years later, as I came to the answer I had been seeking, I still had to divest myself of false assumptions about the knowledge of the medical profession that most people harbour. ‘As long as they are handing out prescriptions, they must know more about this than I do’ was the logic of my unspoken and unexamined thought process. When, at long last, I took a research approach to my own observations, again assuming someone out there in medical cyberspace must already have the explanation for them, it took months of seeking before I could face the truth of the abyssmal ignorance of psychiatrists, doctors, and neurologists, who essentially were lying to patients and their families. Furthermore, they were using deceptive means of getting those families to agree to turn their children over to them -- as if they were guinea pigs or rats -- in their experiments with harmful drugs. A pharmaceutical holocaust was -- and still is -- raging.
“It may be that a less expensive alternative to this new product can be concocted or is already available. The pharmaceutical companies are not interested in solutions that cannot be patented.”
Isabel Gibson’s comment was short and to the point: “I don't know what the answer is for ‘insanely expensive’ drugs, but we need to have the conversation. Again and again. Thanks for putting a personal face on this dilemma.”
Robert Caughell had some info to add: “The doctor who operated on/saved Jimmy Kimmel's son was trained in Toronto at Sick Kids Hospital, I believe. JK's telling of his son's operation has been criticized by politicians as meddling in US politics regarding their health care system. The US sees having access to affordable/available healthcare as a personal choice, where in Canada it is a right for all. In its zeal to replace Obamacare, the GOP will replace it with something worse in the name of politics.”
Sharon Adams pointed out that cystic fibrosis is not the only illness affected by high drug costs: “Canada is far behind on Lyme Disease treatment and coverage also. I have a cousin whose family of four are all afflicted with it. We are better off than many, but we still have people deciding what is covered and what is not.
“But another question that crosses my mind when I hear of expensive drugs is -- are they legitimate costs or has the drug company priced them so high for their own greed, and just because they can?? There have been quite a few disheartening documentaries on cases where this kind of thing has happened.”
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TECHNICAL STUFF
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PROMOTION STUFF…
Ralph Milton ’s latest project is called “Sing Hallelujah” -- the world’s first video hymnal. It consists of 100 popular hymns, both new and old, on five DVDs that can be played using a standard DVD player and TV screen, for use in congregations who lack skilled musicians to play piano or organ. More details at www.singhallelujah.ca
Ralph’s HymnSight webpage is still up, http://www.hymnsight.ca, with a vast gallery of photos you can use to enhance the appearance of the visual images you project for liturgical use (prayers, responses, hymn verses, etc.)
Wayne Irwin's “Churchweb Canada,” an inexpensive service for any congregation wanting to develop a web presence, with free consultation. <http://www.churchwebcanada.ca>
I recommend Isabel Gibson’s thoughtful and well-written blog, www.traditionaliconoclast.com
Alva Wood’s satiric stories about incompetent bureaucrats and prejudiced attitudes in a small town -- not particularly religious, but fun; alvawood@gmail.com to get onto her mailing list.
Tom Watson writes a weekly blog called “The View from Grandpa Tom’s Balcony” -- ruminations on various subjects, and feedback from Tom’s readers. Write him at tomwatso@gmail.com or twatson@sentex.net