Critical Perspectives and Reflections

Rhyming (mostly) Reflections on the State of Our Planet  BOB (ROPE) BREULS  July 14 2019  Photo: The Marsh in Summer at Dead Bear Farm. Cecelia Lee Much of this is not new  As recorded by Canada's own The Guess Who  As the Maple Leaf is unfurled  Sing Don't Give me no Hand-me-down Word.  The sentiment needs much more emphasis  Continue the metamorphosis  To dodge the imminent crisis  For such a beautiful planet ours IS.  Carbon, mercury, lead & cadmium  All out of place, Vomitorium  Neonic pesticide Nuclear waste  Microplastics  Consume, make haste  The frictionless commerce we know translates  Plastic on shelves to marine vertebrates  Demonstration only of friction displaced.  Now frequent are statements of “going green”  While keeping that high carbon regime  Will Earths record as archaeology scene  Well before the Anthropocene  ...

BILL LEE July 10, 2019 Over the last months there have been a series of eruptions of citizen frustration and anger related to the various confusions, miseries, injustices and questions of propriety related to the mean spirited attacks on, and draconian cuts to, a really startling wide array of social, legal, education, political and health programs by the one year plus Conservative Ontario government of Doug Ford. Starting with radically change of the structure of government in the middle of the Toronto municipal election and then moving on to the cancelling of the experiment with a guaranteed minimum wage program and most recently an alteration of services (and reduction of funding) for parents with children who have autism, Ford and his gang of rippers and tearers have disrupted, confused and dismayed a huge swath of the Ontario citizenry. As well many people have been taken aback by the early and often emergence of evidence of Ford’s and his minions attempts at various acts...