I watched this film and in spite of my hubris, my anger, my unwillingness to simply let go, it came to me that the only person I’m damaging by not simply being thankful for what I have, is me.
Life is exceptionally finite. Many of us ‘fight’ our way through life as though the test is to arrive at the end wizened and worn, a testament to our own stubbornness.
Tell me. What is the point in that.
Gratitude is accepting our frailties, our humanness.
We are not immortal. We don’t have anywhere to go. We are only here once, and then, we are gone.
To find peace with ourselves and to contribute something of value each day, if only to ourselves, should be enough.
I haven’t ‘changed the world’, or found the cure for cancer, or saved thousands of lives.
I’ve simply lived.
Yet, I have never had enough gratitude for this life.
I’m 72, and my doctors have told me I should be thankful that I’m alive. I agree. I lived through 20, yes, 20 life threatening events.
And it’s only now, especially when reminded by a man of true wisdom, like Michael, that I come to this place in my life where I can appreciate gratitude, and experience it.
In fact, revel in it.
I am fortunate. I have enough. I need nothing except the company of my wife and my dog, Ollie.
I now, like Michael, find things each day that I can be grateful for.
Coffee in the morning. Sleep, sometimes without great pain. The clouds outside my window. The mist on the mountains, just up the road.
A kiss, that comes with a piece of raisin bread, and the warm breath of Ollie on my shoulder, expecting his morning ‘treat’.
For this, I am grateful. For my health, such as it is, I’m grateful. For the motorcycle I still ride into the mountains where I love to walk, I’m grateful.
Drop your anger. It will kill you as surely as it has killed millions before. Let go of those things you can’t change, and accept that the world is unfair and totally fucked up.
Greed, is not good, and some men whose goal is to do nothing more than take from others what they can, will one day discover that nothing they have is worth anything.
Without respect, without love, without peace and without gratitude, you have absolutely nothing.
Wisdom is not always found, and often it is found too late.
Be grateful for what you have. Love those who matter to you in your life. Be kind. Be generous. Love with all your heart.
How the U.S. Auto Industry Will Die: Not With a Bang… But a Whimper
What is becoming increasingly obvious is that the Big Three, are going to become the Lesser Three by 2035.
The current U.S. administration is ceding the EV world to China, and it’s obvious that it has no intention of either competing or meeting any type of climate change goals through the current administration, — ever.
This week in the Guardian, Lisa O’Carroll wrote an article entitled,
“The Chinese will not pause: Volvo and Polestar bosses urge EU to stick to 2035 petrol car ban”. The article spoke to the challenge that EU auto manufacturers have in producing cars in Europe, that can compete with Chinese vehicles, and how the attempts at keeping Chinese manufacturers out of Europe is a futile exercise that will result in EU automotive manufacturers being incapable of competing in the world of EV technology by 2035.
The chief executive of Polestar, Europe’s only all-electric car manufacturer stated, “Pausing 2035 is just a bad, bad idea. I have no words for that,” said Michael Lohsheller. “If Europe doesn’t take the lead in this transformation, be rest assured, other countries will do it for us.”
Volkswagen CEO, Hakan Samuelsson states, “I don’t see the logic in slowing down. If seat belts were not mandatory, we would probably have 30% of our cars without seatbelts and if you consider the additional cost we probably wouldn’t have any cars with catalytic converters either unless they were mandatory.”
Lohscheller is equally direct. “The Chinese will not pause. They will take over. If Brussels pauses this target and says: ‘Stop, we will give you another five years’, they are putting hundreds and thousands of jobs at risk.
It is worth noting that Chinese automotive manufacturing have been making massive inroads in Europe already.
Volvo, still believed by most to be a Swedish company, is only operated as such. It is owned by Zeijiang Geely since 2010.
But Europe’s woes in relation to vehicle production and electrification of the EU, are nothing compared to the morass of problems facing the United States.
Make America Like the 1950’s Again
Donald J. Trump is setting America up to become completely uncompetitive by 2030. It will have lost the EV revolution to China, entirely, with Japan and Korea likely being the largest, if not their sole competitors.
First, the U.S. has reversed some electrification targets. Trump, ever the wizard of the deal, has revoked a previous Biden order that aimed for 50% new vehicle sales to be electric by 2030.
Just at a time where electrification looked like it was going to see adoption in the U.S., Trump intervened by doubling down on ICE engines and his interests in fossil fuels.
Trump has forced the EPA to lower its emissions rules as well. By allowing hybrids and gas-saving technologies to continue past 2030, it has resulted in some automakers scaling back their EV investments and production plans.
The Trump administration has now frozen all unspent federal funds for vehicle charging stations and is considering ending EV tax credits.
By prolonging the transition to EV’s, the U.S. will fall farther and farther behind the Chinese, Japanese and Koreans, ceding the future EV market to those interests.
American EV’s were already the least efficient, slowest to charge, with the shortest ranges and highest costs, — exactly the opposite of where Chinese manufacturers, and the buying public, worldwide are going.
And the news gets worse the more one delves into the issues facing American manufacturers. Trump’s tariffs mean that American products now face a 35% tariff to be imported into Canada. In addition, the heavily integrated parts industry and supply chains means that many American plants are either slowing their production or attempting to find American parts suppliers, who typically are 35% more expensive than those they are trying to replace from Canada.
This same situation exists in relation to Mexico where labour costs are even lower.
Trump is intent on bringing back ICE engines, which is destined to worsen America’s already significant lack of competitive ability against Chinese vehicles. If Chinese vehicles were allowed to enter the U.S., they would sell for less than half of the price of American made EV’s, which have longer charging times, shorter ranges and older technologies.
Canada is going to drop the 100% tariff it has on Chinese vehicles and provide incentives to Canadians (once again in 2026) to buy EV’s, which from China are expected to cost about half of the current EV vehicle prices in Canada.
What this signals is that for every Geely or BYD EV truck or car sold in Canada, that will be one less Ford, GM or Stellantis vehicle sold.
And competition with China is nye on impossible in America. Labour costs, steel costs, aluminum costs, electronic component costs, battery costs and electric motor costs are all significantly higher.
Just consider this one simple fact:
An American autoworker makes $28.02 an hour on average in Detroit or Kentucky or Texas or Alabama.
Meanwhile in China an automotive worker makes $2.18 U.S. per hour. And that’s before you add on pensions or benefits in the U.S.
So who in America will want to work in an automotive plant, that can compete?
No one.
And robotics won’t help America. Chinese automotive plants are highly technologically advanced and utilize robots to a greater degree than anywhere on earth currently.
Climate Change Will Result in America’s Car Manufacturers Seeing Less and Less Market Share
There is an analogy in the vehicle arena for what is now happening in the U.S. automotive sector. And it should act as a harbinger for what is probable if the Trump administration continues its illegal and self-defeating tariff agenda into the future.
Harley-Davidson motorcycle company.
HD has lost almost three quarters of its market share in a fourteen year period due to a myopic 1950’s attitude towards the manufacture of their motorcycles. By continuing to build motorcycles that the world’s youth doesn’t want, HD is slowly killing its own market.
If Ford, GM and Stellantis continue to double down on ICE vehicles and mild hybrids or hybrids, their market share will continue to decline, while costs escalate and the cost of fuel and maintenance continues to rise, unabated.
In reality, the battle is already over. Only Americans fail to recognize that their competitiveness is no longer valid. China’s EV growth around the world is increasing at an amazing rate.
Chinese EVs are experiencing rapid global growth, especially in emerging markets, though they face strong competition and protectionist barriers in North America, as previously discussed.
China is the world’s largest EV market, andits manufacturers are rapidly expanding their export sales, which surged in 2025 to a record high. Factors driving their success include cost advantages from cheaper batteries and strong government support.
In 2025, two out of three EV’s sold on earth, are now Chinese.
And if the US opens its borders to Chinese vehicles, Ford, GM and Stellantis will become little more than a memory, like Studebaker, which ended production in Canada, in 1966.
The future is anything but bright for U.S. car and light truck manufacturers, but that’s what comes when the President of the United States cares more about his financial interests than the hundreds of thousands of Americans who depend on auto manufacturing.
A Satirical Consideration for the Conclave in Waiting
Well, that didn’t take long, did it?
Trump wants an American pope.
Well hallelujah.
Strange though, Vance met the Pope yesterday, and he died.
I suppose it was all the good vibes he oozed from his pores, eh Vance?
I mean, such a pious, honest and upstanding man as Vance, right?
Yup, the final coersion America.
How about a new Giliad rule for the ages.
Thou must contribute 20% after taxes to the “American Pope’s Purse”.
Yup…
An American pope. Maybe you can find one from Boston who is an abuser, and make him Pope, right?
Someone with all of the values and amazing human attributes of Trump.
Make sure you get one that is a pathological liar, thief, convicted felon, and rapist. Let’s get one that has no values whatsoever, okay? I mean, why start out with expectations, — let’s get right into the larceny, thievery and immorality.
Let’s change the ten commandments to the, eight recommendations or the eight considerations or the eight remote possibilities, or institute a new list of the eight liklihoods, instead.
First, for the rules (exempting any preemption by the Supreme), now the Not So Supreme Court.
Thou shalt not get caught;
Lying, (umm…right)
Raping (damn, been there done that)
Stealing (by the time I was three, oops)
Coveting (geez, look at that….nice)
Murdering ( I can’t say, it was dark and it happened so fast)
Bearing false witness, (oh, that ship has sailed, bigly), and;
Thou shalt not invade another country on odd days.
Thou shalt not nuke another friend, unless they deserve it.
I know that Donald can’t even remember the others, so that’s irrelevant.
Yessir America.
An American Pope from Texas would be good.
The good book in one hand, and an AR 15 in the other.
Maybe America can deport all non-christians, (unless of course they’re cute, right).
This morning Michael Smercomish, on his Saturday morning show, after belabouring the poor state of America’s democracy stated, “Change doesn’t come at the end of a gun.”
I’m not so sure that’s true Michael, for I fear the United States is getting closer and closer to discovering whether that statement holds water, domestically.
I’m not at all sure there aren’t Americans who believe whole-heartedly that they not only can, but will, create change with the use of a gun. If their attempt to enforce the playbook were to stumble, they would turn to accomplishing what they ‘plan for’ through the use of a well-worn playbook. A playbook that tyrants and dictators have used, studied, and know well.
In 1991 we saw what happens when evil men attempt to institute their vision as a replacement for democracy. The debacle in the Balkans finally came to an end in 2001, with the criminal convictions of those who instigated those wars. However, it cost the lives of 140,000 people, and only came to an end because NATO intervened.
But NATO is a force that Donald Trump wants America to leave. “What has NATO done for us?” is his mantra. Once again, if NATO had not been available to force Serbia to stop or face destruction, it undoubtedly would have continued. He wants to leave for a number of reasons, mostly unspoken, for even he doesn’t want to show his hand at this point.
The plan calls for Trump to make sure that Russia will oversee the divvying up of Ukraine as a fait-accompli by the United States and by so doing reward his fellow sociopath, Vladimir. Trump dislikes Volodymyr Zelensky simply because he is not a wimp or coward (like trump himself). Zelensky has the courage to ignore both trump and Putin’s wishes, and will not only fight, but will win if support is maintained. Therefore, there is the need by Trump to submarine the possibility of Ukraine winning the war, by refusing to provide weapons and ammunition.
Remember, trump is all about winning the zero-sum game, irrespective of how many die or lose their country. How else would he be able to secure his future fortunes and ensure that Russia will assist him, behind the scenes as time unfolds?
Herr Trump, the new Reichfuhrer-SS and Fuhrer of the Incoming Fascist Regime is attempting to suppress the free press and any dissenting voices. He publicly calls the free press, ‘enemies of the state’, calling them out as anti-democratic, and has stacked the Federal Courts with his personal legal henchmen and minions to ensure the enforcement of his wishes.
He has even installed a new leader of the incoming Schutzstaffel, a Billionaire named Elon Himmler to carry out his destruction of the departments that may pose opposition.
At the same time he is suing any and all he doesn’t agree with in an attempt to not just suppress but subjugate the free press. We are on the verge of democracy no longer truly existing in the United States.
And a theocratic group of kleptocrats are waiting in the wings to suppress non-white voters and women in an effort to create the hypocritical theocracy whose model they want to install.
I think the ‘playbook’ has been drawn up by the sociopathic hand of men like Bannon and his minions, (and that is no animated cartoon) so that the plan is ready and has been disseminated to the appropriate gangs of ‘proud boys’ or forces that come from current military forces in the U.S.. They in turn, are simply awaiting the green light.
I fear that an event, staged by the fascist leader himself will lead to a modern version of ‘Kristallnacht”, providing the excuse he needs to institute martial law, and thereby cement control in the soon to be Fascist States of America.
He will enforce martial law, and then curfews. His deputizing of ‘brown shirts’ with extrajudicial powers to enforce extrajudicial measures will lead to the arrest of those who stand in his way.
We have seen this playbook before. We pretend it was just a bad memory by a very evil man. Yet, almost every tinpot dictator throughout history has sought to accomplish what trump is doing in America today.
While I don’t live in America, I will retain the necessary metal instruments to ensure that, — when, — not if, hell is unleashed in America, I feel confident of having taken the necessary steps to assist in the safety of those people in my world that matter, inside a functional democracy that eschews trump’s objectives and plans.
We are on the precipace of societal armed resistance and civil war in the United States. I would have given a one in four chance of armed insurrection a year ago. Today, I think the odds are one in three. All it will take, unfortunately is the spark that America’s Reichfuhrer-SS will instigate once anointed on January 20, 2025.
The only potential means of avoiding societal disintegration in the United States in the near future is to remove the man responsible.
Again, unfortunately, political violence in the United States is moving from the sidelines to center field.
It is just as likely that trump will see his impediments to dictatorship disempowered prior to unleashing hell on America.
Personally, I intend to stay as far away from America as possible, – in every way possible.
We may well be in the final days of democracy in the U.S. and it is beginning to feel like a dystopian novel about the end of reason and the end of dissent.
Trump will loose his ‘proud boys’ in an effort to suppress dissent. He will blame the loss of life in the coming ‘event’ on a scapegoat, the attack of which will be unleashed by trump in an effort to ‘protect America from Anti-American Forces’.
This scenario, this scheme or plot, will come to fruition, in spite of all those fighting for democracy and free speech, because the final act requires complete victory and submission.
Why? Because trump intends on this being the last gasp of democracy. After this, democracy will be just a word, that people speak of in hushed remembrance.
That’s my take on the future of America, and so far, the playbook is open, the ball is on the tee, and we’re almost at kickoff time.
Yesterday, I was sitting in the hospital, awaiting having the staples removed from my leg. Almost two years have gone by since I had a serious compound fracture of my leg due to a vehicle accident. I’m certainly not a kid, or even remotely young, but having much less time going forward than looking back, has made me aware, that I’m in a hurry.
I’m in a hurry for achievement and meaning that satisfies. The impetus for this is not acquisition, money or ‘things’, per se, it’s about experiences. I want to have enough time to, first; know what my bucket list of experiences are, and to then take part in the doing of those acts, – something, – not simply awaiting for disease or accumulated physical damage to overtake my willingness, ability or commitment to ‘experience’.
And I’m impatient for the physical act of doing and of having the resources and the financial and physical capacity to make those experiences real.
I have made some choices and maintained one relationship that wasn’t shall I say, either financially intelligent or emotionally intelligent. One in particular unfortunately shaped my retirement, to my financial detriment. Had I been a more self-interested person, I would, and should have acted to end what would become a personal disaster.
But, to my eternal regret, that wasn’t to be.
As I awaited another x-ray ordered by my doc to assess whether it was wise to remove the hardware, screws and plates in my knee, tibia and fibula, I was struck by the number of people sitting in wheelchairs, or using crutches due to amputations. Yes, amputations. Not broken bones or hip or knee replacements, but amputations.
My orthopaedic surgeon is a reasonably young, active guy who takes part in a lot of activities that hold some level of risk. I know this because we are, I would suggest, kindred spirits of a kind. He, like I, rides a motorcycle, he snowshoes, snowmobiles, cross country skis and, strange for a kid from Manitoba, climbs and loves to trek in the mountains at altitude. Not something easily done for a boy living on the prairies.
He, like I, has had a number of what he calls, “intentionals”, otherwise known as accidents. He subscribes to the school of “use it or lose it” and suggests that when he is old and unable to no longer act with ”intention”, that he will have, no regrets, but a bucket full of experiences and memories.
I have thought about that quite a lot of late, after another rather lengthy conversation, while he was surveying the damage to my bones. And then he said something that, – I can’t say surprised me, but clearly made me aware of how his vocation helped and helps to frame his mindset. He said this;
“Every day I have to consult with other doctors and prosthetists, for patients who have undergone amputation. Most of those patients and most of their amputations, are caused, not by accident, nor by adventure or misadventure, but by abuse and conspicuous consumption. Thepeople I see, choose to consume alcohol, but mostly sugar and foods filled with sugar that leads them to illness, obesity, diabetes, and often and predictably, to amputation. It’s incredibly saddening that our society not only allows, but enables those people to destroy their own bodies”.
He continued,
“ I know it sounds apathetic, but every day I see patients with no resolve, no willingness to fight their cravings, as though they are slaves to a substance, no different than meth addicts. And, I still can’t completely resolve my anger, – if I’m honest, because that’s what it is, that’s what it has become. The people who come through this door every day are, and were, directly responsible for their deteriorating physical condition and illnesses, yet they remain either unwilling or unable to do anything in order to change. But those most responsible are the ones who created the demand for sugar, no different than drug lords, they are responsible.”
I just nodded, – aware of how many amputees I had seen in the waiting room. There were only six patients waiting, yet three were missing either legs or feet. And equally saddening was the fact that these people were, except for one, aboriginal or native.
He went silent as he continued to remove the staples from my leg and knee.
He then said, “So I don’t think you need to see me again, now that you’re back to normal. I laughed, saying, “As much as I like you doc, I think I don’t care to meet like this anymore. I’m good.”
He made a wry smile, “Well, good luck and keep doing what moves you. Besides, you and I know what ails us”, and then he laughed.
We shook hands, and I said, “Thanks for everything doc”, as I walked out of his office, past the orthopaedic waiting room once again, where I couldn’t help but notice that there were two more people with obviously missing appendages.
I caught the eye of one woman, sitting in her wheelchair, heavily overweight, who looked exhausted and sad. I smiled at her, and in return she just looked through me with a vacant stare, blank, focused on nothing.
It made me genuinely sad.
Never, I told myself, in silence, and vowed to avoid sugar to the greatest degree possible. Sugar is simply a toxin. It will kill you if you let it.
We all know the risks, yet we act as though sugar consumption is benign. It isn’t, – and we’re deluding ourselves if we think it’s not responsible for a great deal of what ails us.
My father was mildly diabetic, now a sister and brother as well, so diabetes is and has taken a toll.
Jason Fung, a Canadian nephrologist, whose books I read and often reference stated the following,
He suggests that for the average person, the easiest and best way to avoid the problems related to sugar intake, (not conspicuous intake), but that which is simply found in refined foods within our western diet, – is to intermittently and with intention, fast.
I’ll write an article about its value in the near future, as I’ve intermittently fasted and been a KETO diet follower, most of my life.
In any event, my hope is that someday, the food industry executives who have become rich, deliberately creating sugar addicts, will, like the Sackler family who created people’s addictions to OxyContin, — be held responsible, sued, found guilty and publicly identified to their shame.
No one should profit from causing people to suffer from diseases they were instrumental in causing.
I have spent an inordinate amount of time, missing a man, I never knew. A man whose talent was so wonderfully, beautifully human that if I were able to bring him back, just for awhile, and so that I spend that time in his company, I would happily forego many of the so-called pleasures of life that I used to think important.
My life has been incredible in many ways, and yet, I squandered many opportunities by making choices based on hubris, narcissism or being so forward looking, that I missed the essence and the rare importance of those moments. And, once gone, they could not be recalled or reanimated. They now seem so ephemeral, I wonder at times if I was there at all?
I find physical pain is nothing in contrast to the pain of regret. I won’t take pain killers, —not because I consider it macho or want to appear as tough or stoic, but simply because pain provides context to the moment, and to life. I know that sounds strange, but I truly mean it.
Pain is the measure by which I can remember occurrences, events and their importance, — or stupidity. Pain, —- teaches lessons. It holds you in time and becomes strangely poignant.
Regret is incredibly painful. More so than the pain I’ve lived through physically, which has been by many people’s standards, quite impressive. But physical pain often fades, yet regret stays, like a hot water bottle perpetually attache to your feet as though necessary after a frigid immersion in icy water.
I won’t bore you with my regrets, for I have many.
And so it is that I find solace in reflecting on how one actor, one comedian, one — humanist, was lost to us through the demon of mental illness. His legacy stands head and shoulders above most of us and our achievements, yet, he was humble, self-effacing and a gentle soul, as witnessed by those around him.
His willingness to let us see inside the man, fleetingly, provided many of us with a moment of reflection and sadness at the things we too left behind, often, so many years ago. Distant and opaque.
The man of whom I speak, was Robin Williams. He had a profound effect on me in many ways, and I often wish I could have known him, for I think I would have been the better for it. He said something in a stand-up comedy routine once, which resonated with me, and still does, — like an echo that you’re not sure you heard or you imagined.
It explains in part my own wish for what he suggested was, madness. Because for me, the best parts of my existence were when I took part in acts, that to many observers, would seem to be, utter madness.
As I get to an age where one is prone on reflection, – the days long and the actions few, it strikes me that what I now need in my life, is; “a little spark of madness”. Madness is what keeps us alive and vibrant. I once again want to climb mountains, dive with great whites, or race my motorcycle at ridiculous speed down long, windswept desert roads, with no caution for my life or limb.
Time is of the essence, and yet, days flow like water and mix together so that I sometimes am not aware of time at all. And then, it happens. I hear a memory, or remember a line of prose, often barely spoken, softly.
“You’re only given a little spark of madness. You can’t ever lose it, or… without it, —- you’re nothing.”
Time is my enemy, as is normalcy and the mundane. Sparks need to fly…
Life demands that one live it, fearlessly, painfully, enthusiastically, leaving sparks behind like fireflies in the night.
So I live for those moments. Madness invigorates, enthuses, illuminates and hold me there, —- alive in that moment of wonder.
About two months ago I made a trip on my sport touring motorcycle down to Minnesota. The plan was to travel across Minnesota to Duluth and then travel up Lake Superior’s coastline to photograph the fall colours.
What transpired was a lesson into how quickly America has devolved into two camps that seem to viscerally hate each other. I must admit, it shocked me. The hate speech emanating from the right had infected Minnesotans in such a way that I literally found it impossible to have a rational conversation surrounding politics. Group think and hate speech had become prevalent across the state. Right wing Republicans and Left Wing Democrats sat and sit on an immense divide, devoid of intelligent discourse, rationality or reason. I had never seen America in such a state.
Twenty years ago I would never have believed that what I was witnessing was possible. You see I was a firefighter and Fire Chief for 43 years, now retired, and over that time I had many interactions, conventions and IAFC conferences with American Fire Chiefs and firefighters generally. I found the majority to be affable, empathic, interested in public service and forward looking.
What I found on my trip, attempting to have a normal conversation at coffee shops, restaurants and rest stops was mistrust, anger, demonization of the ‘others’, and an environment so polarized that no person was not entrenched on one side or the other.
I also discovered something else. The Republican Right is dominated by religious zealots with a passion for hating anyone who is not.
At one stop in NorthEastern Minnesota, I stopped to warm up and have a coffee at a local cafe, and overheard a conversation that actually stunned me, about how the men at the table ought to beat the hell out of those who disagreed with them. One man, obviously a trump supporter, looked over at me and asked if I was riding the motorcycle outside. I said that yes, I was. He then asked where I was from. I said, Canada, and he said, “What are you doing down here?” I said I was just riding through the state to photograph the fall colours and would head back in a few days. He asked, “So what do you think about those Democrats in Washington? I realized by the tone in his voice that he intended to let me know what he thought of them.
I thought for a second, and reflected on the trump stickers on the windows of the cars outside, the MAGA hats on two of the men at the table, and thought that discretion was the best way to respond. I said, “Well I think both sides need to listen to each other, and to come to some agreement about the future that respects the positions of both sides.
One man let out a ‘guffaw’ and under his breath, said, “Liberal Fuck”. I was a bit surprised, and decided to not offer any further commentary. The man I was speaking to said. “Democrats are all about themselves and they don’t give a fuck about the white men and women who make this country great.” I was careful not to disagree, and said that “I understand that, but the world is changing and it would be great if we could just understand what makes the other side tick.”
I should also tell you that I taught college part-time and one of the courses I instructed was, “Conflict Resolution”.
The man who had interjected the guttural laugh just asked, “Where are you from in Canada?” I answered, “Winnipeg”. His response was as unequivocal as it was strident.
“Well, I suppose you’d best get on the road and get back there.”
His face was one of anger.
I didn’t say anything in return. I quickly finished my coffee, paid my bill and left the cafe.
I learned something important that day. It was obvious that there would be no middle ground in America. You are either with us, or against us, at least that was the position of the far right.
An observation as I rode through the state, also was obvious. The poorer the neighbourhoods, the more Trump signs in evidence, and the more, “God is a Republican” signs or sentiment existed.
I felt unwelcome, alienated and to some extent, abused. I did indeed turn around and head back to the Canadian border, all the wiser for my brief sojourn into the world of America’s political anger and animosity.
When I pulled up to the customs window, six hours later, I was met with a pretty, young CBSA agent who asked, “How was your trip to the U.S.? Quickly followed by the question. “Is it getting any better over there?”
I looked at her and smiled, “No, it isn’t.”
She just nodded, passed me my passport, and said, “Welcome Home.”
I said it was great to be home, and drove off.
Anecdotally, it will be the last time I travel to the United States. I found it to be hostile, uninviting and truly irrational. There is much to do and see in this world, and I’ll do just that, — excluding America.
My mind wandered back to Trumps first iteration in 2016, and a thought scampered across my mind.
Harley Davidson hasn’t made a right decision, that I can remember. Yesterday, the company’s plan to avoid European custom duties, failed. HD had been sued over its attempt to import motorcycles into Europe, without paying customs duties.
Rideapart.com reported yesterday that;
According to the EU’s Court of Justice, “The case arose after Harley-Davidson moved part of its motorcycle production from the US to Thailand following the EU’s imposition of additional customs duties of 25% on U.S. – origin motorcycles.” This, however, was deemed as “aimed primarily to avoid duties and deemed it economically unjustified under Article 33 of Delegated Regulation 2015/2446.”
When Trump was last in office, he imposed a set of tariffs on European goods. The EU responded with its own counter-tariffs, which imposed a 25 percent duty on American goods, including Harley-Davidson.
A country where no tariffs were to be imposed, however was Thailand. So, Harley moved part of its production to Thailand, specifically the portion of its motorcycles that get sent to the European Union. This way, it could hopefully avoid tariffs by claiming that their motor or cycles were Thai in origin, not American.
Well the ruse failed, as did Harley’s final appeal to the court, and the import duties will now have to be paid.
So what does this mean for Harley?
In 2023, Harley-Davidson sold 32,200 bikes in Europe. That number was down 23% from the year before, and that was without the additional 25% import duties being added to the price of the bikes. Similarly, in Canada, Harley sold another 8,000 motorcycles in 2023, sans tariffs.
However, Trump is planning on duplicating the fiasco he imposed on Harley-Davidson, the first time he was President, (we all know Trump now hates HD since they had the temerity to attempt to survive by moving some of their production to Thailand). Additionally, Trump, – ‘stellar genius’ that he is, became even more incensed over HD making a deal with Hero Motor Company of India, to build HD’s smaller motorcycles under license for HD in China.
Well, boy genius is back, and he says he will add the 25% to all imported goods from Canada, and slap further tariffs, (the most ‘beautiful word’, according to Trump) on European, Mexican, Canadian and Chinese goods.
Great, – you just drove the final stake through the heart of HD, Mr. Stable Genius. As I wrote in a previous article, “Harley-Davidson’s Swan Song”, HD will be lucky to sell “A” motorcycle in Canada or Europe, Mexico or China.
Seeing as Harley-Davidson is losing money faster than mango man can add tariffs, HD sales will likely lose another 42,000 units. That would mean that Harley sales will likely be less than 120,000 motorcycles in 2025 without factoring in other losses from around the world, that continue to mount. For a company that sold 380,000 units just ten years ago, the fall has been precipitous.
How long can Harley Davidson continue?
Not long, — and that was before El Presidente sought to impose his own irrationality into the situation.
Harley Davidson is destined to be sold or go bankrupt, and the final stake through the heart of Harley will have been hammered there by its own Presidential Hammerhead.
Maslow’s hammer, a business theory taught to novices at college, has become trump’s favourite and only tool. “When all you have is a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail.”
Well America, your hammerhead has, once again, arrived.
Justin Trudeau and the Liberal Party of Canada have gone from reasoned to irrational since coming to office almost ten years ago. One specific area where over reach has become irrational has to do with firearms in Canada.
I am all in favour of controlling weapons and the access of weapons to criminals. Unfortunately the measures that are being taken by the Federal Government will have no effect on keeping weapons out of the hands of criminals. The banning of weapons from law abiding citizens simply is a political exercise, designed to garner votes from those on one extreme end of the liberal electorate.
The weapons that are most utilized in crimes are those being brought across illegally from the United States. While the number of guns being sold illegally in Canada, is on the rise, it is the criminal element that is the problem, not the hunter or marksman who stores his weapons and ammunition safely to ensure that if their property were ever broken into, that a thief could not access those weapons.
By banning weapons, and not providing full reimbursement to those who own them, the government is simply ensuring that weapons will either be sold illegally or hidden. It is the opposite of rationality. If the Canadian government wants to ensure public safely that badly that they will treat all Canadians with now banned weapons as potential criminals, then the least they can do is reimburse owners for the full value of the weapons they chose to ban.
Many gun owners, like myself, don’t hunt. We shoot as a hobby and/or compete as marksmen. By banning the weapons we utilize for sport, not even hunting, the government is being irrational, heavy handed and irresponsible. For marksmen, these guns are fired at indoor ranges, where we have paid dues annually to be able to fire these federally approved weapons. It was the Liberal government that just two years ago deemed these weapons to be legal, now, only to have them made illegal after the same current Liberal government previously banned 1500 weapons for sale, use or resale in 2022. The currently now additionally banned weapons (as of October 30th, 2025) were bought as ‘approved firearms’ under the legislation that, again, this same Liberal government created, just two years ago.
What this suggests to me, quite clearly, is that the current government doesn’t have a clue in relation to policy development that impacts a significant percentage of the Canadian population, both in the urban environment and rural. Fortunately, it would seem that Canadians will end the tenure of the Liberal Party in the next election, resoundingly. Canadians, myself now included are fed up with Trudeau’s arrogance and knee jerk reactionary decisions.
Gun laws for the transport and use of these weapons already ensure that legitimate and lawful gun owners pose no risk with these weapons. They cannot be transported without being unloaded, without ammunition, trigger locked and ammunition within a locked ammunition box, separated from the weapon. If an individual were to not follow the laws, already in place, seizure of the weapon and criminal charges would be pursued.
Canada now sits in a precarious position in relation to both sovereignty and security for its citizens.
We currently live in a world becoming increasingly dangerous and chaotic, particularly since Canada now abuts a country where chaos is about to ensue, – disarming Canadians seems like an even more irrational response. If Canada’s military were in a position to secure the sovereignty of Canadians, I would feel much happier than at the present time. The existing Canadian government has allowed the Canadian military to degrade to such a state that it’s probable they would be completely ineffectual against any sort of serious incursion onto sovereign Canadian territory, and now Canadians will be in a position whereby they cannot even defend themselves.
Police are becoming increasingly overwhelmed in Canada’s major cities due to the activities of criminal gangs. Many of these gangs have formed from within populations that have immigrated to Canada and from within foreign countries where crime and gang activity has been allowed to flourish.
The statements from the previous two paragraphs would have seemed like an absurdity to me in my youth. Today, it seems the most rational response one can have to the impending disaster that is being visited upon the United States of America is to take responsibility for your own safety. I have virtually no trust that the United States will not at some point in the not distant future invade Canada to secure its own strategic aims.
The United States is now led by a kleptocratic sociopath, intent on creating an autocracy and to the destruction of democratic institutions in the U.S. Personally, I will never again trust America to secure the sovereignty and security of Canadians, or to maintain an honest and open relationship that assists both economies. America cares only about America, and its self-interest.
It is absolutely time for Canada and Canadians to reappraise their relationship with the United States, regardless of how difficult that may prove, – as becoming subjugated to America and its interests is something I personally have no interest in accommodating. I am sure that if Canadians had that question posed to them formally, Canadians writ-large would reject America’s politics and societal beliefs currently on display.
Personally, I also have no faith in our Federal Government to do anything that will secure Canada’s interests. Justin Trudeau willfully grovelled to Trump just this week, rather than stand up and be counted in opposition to Trump’s ignorance and arrogance.
The dilemma facing Canadians is that neither can Canadians trust the Conservative Party of Canada which caters to the extreme right wing fringe within Canada. Without a viable alternative, it would seem irrational for those of us who use our intelligence and logic to willfully accept decisions made by either a Liberal or Conservative government, as it isn’t representing the values of most Canadians. It seems questionable whether either party are willing to protect and secure Canadian security and independence of action on behalf of Canadians.
I have no faith that either or both parties will not sell out Canadians in the long run to Capitalist Kleptocrats and the 1% in the United States.
Unless you’ve living in a cave in Mongolia without any form of connection to the outside world, you have to realize that we, you, me and virtually everyone on earth, are living on borrowed time. It doesn’t matter what your philosophical views are, or your political or economic beliefs. The world is rapidly becoming sick, and that sickness can; and has been ignored, for awhile, – but at some point the virus becomes airborne and we’re all infected, contaminated and apparently, were an oncologist providing his prognosis, – in stage five of the disease.
It’s not just the environment, the world and nature’s health, but the attitudes of humans, the dominant form of life on this tiny orb in space. The greed, the hatred, the indifference to suffering, the never-ending seeking for ‘more’. For the poor, seeking more, – even just a little more, be it food, peace, security, health, opportunity or kindness, any would be wonderful, welcomed, invigorating and life affirming. Yet, for most of the third world, it is little more than a dream, so ephemeral that fantasies are closer to reality than even to hope.
Meanwhile, a few, billionaires, and a host of many wanna-be millionaires, possess 95% of virtually everything that there is to have. According to “Concern Worldwide”, 733 million people, or 1 in 11 people on earth, go hungry every single day. In Africa, 1 in 5 go hungry. Hunger accounts for 45% of all children’s deaths, and malnutrition is the largest single contributor to disease in the world. (Actually, those numbers are already out of date, according to the United Nations in 2024 that number rose to 828 million people).
War and climate change, nationalism, tribalism and racism, will make all of this worse, and we are fuelling all of these associated problems and endemic realities with ignorance, arrogance and indifference.
So what? , you say. It’s been like this as long as man has been on this earth. Well, actually, around the year 1900, there was a point of stasis and sustainability. The world’s population then was approximately 2.2 Billion human beings. But rather than maintain a sustainable world or the future, we enabled the rise of corporations, globalization and an unlimited appetite for acquisition. It didn’t matter what capitalism had to do in order to create the mechanisms for continuous growth and greed to become the sole criteria for industry and business to attain, we, the less than wealthy let it happen. On top of that, we were happy when a few crumbs fell off the unlimited buffet onto our empty laps.
No one in those years of unlimited growth and opportunity worried about the ‘others’, the uneducated, the poor, the disenfranchised, and the countries with no resources or wealth. Wherever there was money to e made, that was where corporations would gorge themselves. Once satisfied, with shareholders fat and happy, it was time to move on, take everything of value with you, and find a new ‘host’ to feed upon. Too bad about the landscape, too bad about the environment, too bad about the poor. That’s the way of the world, right?
And this has essentially continued unremittingly for 250 years, and in that time, the fortunate few have increased their share of the world’s resources and riches whereby today, Oxfam states the following:
Greed has come to rule, ingest and own the planet we depend on to survive, yet millions of people continue to seek the holy grail of disenfranchising those who already have next to nothing, of what little they have left.
They have become so successful at it, that they buy the politicians who were appointed to look out for the rest of us. Instead we have built kleptocracies, not democracies. The world is owned by the 1% who own the people who should protect us from the greed of the 1%.
Whistling in the Dark
Most of us ignore the worst of what’s happening, and why not? What can I do? Nothing I complain about or speak out about will change what is happening, they, “the 1%” own the media, the politicians, the wealth, and soon, those who have to date believed institutions created to secure and hold safe, democracy.
But is there really any democracy left to be had? The 1% control every facet of the democracy, from our health, wealth, education, the economy, – even the availability and compensation levels for remuneration for our labour. They have the ability to create opinion and to influence how those opinions will translate into governance, and if we don’t like their particular style of governance, they control our voice and the ability to act or action what we dislike.
Never has democracy, real democracy been more imperilled than it is at this late hour. We are on the verge of dictatorship. All the organs of power are in the hands of a very few wealthy, unethical and amoral men and women, about to exert their will on the majority, both economically, socially and legally.
The saddest part of all of it, is that it was accomplished with the agreement, acquiescence and complicity of the majority of citizens who are so encumbered with debt, self-doubt, anger, hate, racism and greed, that they have sold themselves to ‘slave masters’ with their vote.
The future has never been more tenuous, and there is no god to help us.
