Vol. XXI, No. 7, 8, & 9 July, August & September 2003
The Western Separatist Papers has been
published (usually) monthly by W.S.P. Ltd. since 1983. Address all
correspondence to WSP, Box 101, 255 Menzies Street, Victoria, B.C. Western Canada V8V 2G6.
A one-year subscription is $15.00. Members of the Western Canada Concept receive
the WSP with their membership.
Send e-mail to kzubko@shaw.ca. Visit the WCC on the web at: www.westcan.org
Phone us at: 250-727-3438
or fax us at: 250-479-3294
Thanks to everyone who sent me such encouraging letters, cards and information since I wrote about being diagnosed with breast cancer in the last edition of this newsletter. What a way to celebrate publishing for 20 years! I want to let you all know that I am doing very well, following the surgery, but will be embarking upon the chemotherapy journey soon, which will last some months. I feel very positive about everything so far, and very grateful for the wonderful help I have had in the medical system, and outside the medical system among those providing both conventional and unconventional therapies. I am using every means within reach to fight and greatly appreciate the wonderful support from you.
I am hoping that there might be someone who would undertake to publish this newsletter during the next months. If you would like to assume this project, please contact Doug at 250-888-3410, or by fax at 250-479-3294, or by writing to us at dougchristie@shaw.ca. We are making arrangements to have the website updated regularly by someone else, and the great efforts of Ernie and Peter continue to keep the mail answered. Doug also is continuing to do whatever he can to speak, write, do interviews and generally be an advocate for Western Independence. I believe one of the best therapies for us all is to continue to struggle for our ideals. I guess we'll see how this theory plays out during the coming months.
A lot continues to happen regarding Western separatism in the west. The struggles regarding for example, mad cow disease, and the forest fire situation serve to underline the fundamental problems facing the West in Canada. There continues to be a response among Western Canadians that favours Independence, no matter how beaten down we are by our circumstances. We are continuing to receive petitions in the mail, and fax and online.
Keltie Zubko
No path of flowers leads to glory
Jean de la Fontaine, French poet whose Fables are a masterpiece of French literature, 1621-1695
Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.
Lord Acton
Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny.
Robert Heinlein
It is impossible to understand the history of economic thought if one does not pay attention to the fact that economics as such is a challenge to the conceit of those in power.
Ludwig von Mises
By Doug Christie
It is already obvious that the arguments for western separatism are growing daily. With hundreds of millions of dollars for Toronto's SARS problems, and tens of millions for Alberta's mad cow problem, Ralph Klein still says he's not a separatist.
With Western Canadian forests burning by the hundreds of thousands of acres, Ottawa and its perverted members of parliament spend their vast intellectual energies debating the ludicrous concept of same sex marriage. As Rome burns, the emperor fiddles.
The state of affairs is so obviously in favour of Western separatism that one wonders at the profound silence in Western Canada. Are we beaten down so badly that we do not dare to fight again?
There is however in Alberta a movement to start a new party. And of course this is once again the recreation of a little sandbox in which the federalists would like Western separatists to play. I know, having founded parties in four Western provinces that political parties are a control mechanism of the established order. The electoral laws are designed to make it difficult if not impossible to create a new party, without inherent flaws, both of financial accountability and internal organization. Anyone who thinks that a new political party is going to solve the problem, should look carefully at the situation of Pauline Hansen.
She was after all the One Nation Party founded in Australia, who advocated putting Australia first. She opposed Asian immigration and special fights for aborigines. She became the instant enemy and lightening rod of opposition for all the liberals and socialists of Australia.
This is much like the situation of the Western Separatists who want to put Western Canada first, and build a nation founded on our principles and true to our culture and our heritage. She as we are and would be, was instantly labelled a racist, a bigot and right-wing redneck, and any other epithet that could be thrown. The media, at the beck and call of their liberal masters, slandered her mercilessly. At the end of it all, using the cleverly designed electoral laws, as a built in trap, she was charged and convicted of inappropriately using campaign funds or electoral proceeds, in effect, committing some sort of electoral fraud. It must be kept in mind, that the electoral laws were designed for this very purpose, to trap the unsophisticated and the unwary.
Keep in mind that the existing political parties built the machinery that traps the little fish and they have vast hordes of lawyers and accountants, to enable them to wend their way through the arcane logic of electoral laws. Those unsophisticated people in Alberta that think they will be able to create a new party should keep in mind that even the Chief Electoral Officer is appointed by the Premier, and in fact it is clear that in times in my experience, the Chief Electoral Officer was very clever in establishing rulings that would feed the fires of internal dissent.
It should be borne in mind equally firmly, that to enable a whole movement to establish a new country, a party is the very opposite instrument with which to attain the goal. Parties divide people; movements unite people.
There is however a very simple and clear solution. When the petition that we have circulated, identifies the one specific goal that everybody wants, that is independence and a new nation of Western Canada, chosen by us in a referendum in each province, legally possible because of the Clarity Act, we know that the enemy truly shudders. For once he cannot divide and conquer Western Canadians if we all agree on the one thing that we need, that is to build a new nation.
Our opponents, call them federalists, call them the established order, call them the Liberal party, call them whatever you like, what they want is control. They fear the establishment of a political movement that is not controlled by the Elections Act, not subject to regulation by legislation, but is founded on the simple principle of freedom of assembly, freedom of choice and freedom of expression.
The movement directed by and founded on the petition for a referendum on independence, crosses all party lines, unites people from left, right, and centre in the one thing that makes sense, the escape we need from the corruption of Ottawa and all its works.
If you do not realize the necessity of independence now, there really is no hope to persuade you. But if you do, please keep in mind, that uniting with people of different political persuasions in pursuit of our common goal is essential and to pick nits over the colour of one's flag while the enemy approaches is a foolish enterprise. We need for Western Canadians, a common consensus, built on the principles of our petition.
This petition is still going and will continue to go until the end of the year, at which time it will be presented at least to the Premier of Alberta. If British Columbia has not burnt to a crisp, and if Alberta has not collapsed in agricultural disaster, and if the will and spirit of Western Canadians still arises with hope, we are the only answer. If they establish same-sex marriage in Ottawa, stamped with approval by the black-robed politicians in the Supreme Court building, it will be one more piece of evidence that Canada does not stand for what we want.
It is very obvious some people have lost confidence in the judiciary. There are some judges who are impartial. There are many more who have achieved their elevation to the bench through political connections and consider their function to be the ratification of the political will of their appointers by means of legal argument. They are quite capable of result-oriented analysis.
To place all one's confidence in the judiciary and leave to them the ultimate power to decide what is morally right and morally wrong, is to vastly overburden the capacity of mere graduates of law schools, and residents of the position of “My Lord” or “My Lady.” They are, after all, only human and they are after all, not necessarily trained, educated or even concerned about the long-term fundamental moral implications or philosophical basis of many of the decisions they are asked to make. Much as they are in many cases, respectable and honourable individuals, the system should never have endowed the judiciary with the capacity to expand on the legislative decisions of parliament to include things that parliament specifically did not approve. Far too many judgments play politics, and the judiciary are not disinclined to make political analysis into legal reasoning.
There is therefore at this time an essential need to communicate one fundamental realization. If the western separatist movement is not to be continually fragmented and perpetually vulnerable to legal attack, it must not be based on a political party within the electoral system. The electoral laws are designed to achieve the control of power in the hands of the existing political parties. It is cleverly designed and has created many built in traps and stops for any potential populist movement.
A populist movement does not need a political party to achieve political success. It needs education, communication and dedication. There is no “easier, softer way.” A political party is simply a playpen for idiots. It brings out the worst in people when they fight over offices. It creates a false image of existing structure, where none really exists. It establishes once and for all that human fallibility once exploited by the media, makes all arguments look ridiculous.
The media knows exactly how to look for the weakest link in any political chain, to give that weakest link massive publicity and inflate the ego of anyone they want to use as their battering ram against the bulwark of the political movement. Political parties are in essence designed to fail if they are seeking power and be invincible if they have power.
In this country, government has grown and political parties have grown along with government. They have legislated tax and financial advantages for themselves, but they have prevented the emergence of competition by the a simple mechanism of accounting and of accountability. There is no trust inherent in the Elections Act, for any political party. There are obligations and no benefits. If you are in power, just the reverse is true. The benefits are disproportionate to the obligations.
So keep in mind what happened to Pauline Hansen, who at this very time is in jail for breaking electoral laws that were designed to make her fail. Comprehend once and for all that political parties are not the only way to achieve political change.
If someone thought they were, ask if Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, or the other signatories of American Declaration of Independence were Democrats or Republicans. They were neither. They were Americans.
I am a Western Canadian. The Western Canada Concept is an idea, the idea of the birth of a new nation. That's all we have to articulate. Our grievances are clear in our petition, and in the minds and hearts in every thinking person in Western Canada. We don't need or want to create constitutions, by-laws local organizations, or local funding nightmares. Responsibility without control is inherent in the political structure of existing political parties.
We don't have the sophistication or expertise to run vast political machines but we do have the power to inspire ordinary people to believe in their hearts and minds, to sign a document, and to help others to sign the same document.
Until the existing power structure realizes that at the foundation of everything, is the popular will, and the popular will is for independence of Western Canada, then and only then, will Ralph Klein and all the rest of the politicians be anxious to lead the parade which somebody else started in a direction they never contemplated.
Yours for Independence,
Douglas Christie
Western Canada Concept Meeting
Leduc
Inn, Leduc, Alberta, Tuesday,
October 7th, 7:30 p.m.
Doug Christie will speak about recent events in Western Canada. Please come and bring your ideas and help. Everyone welcome.