Toronto karma cookie

This is a story about karma and a cookie. I’m not sure which way the karma goes, if this was a reward for something, or making up for something bad, or if I'm next up for a spontaneous act of kindness, but something good happened, a small thing, and it was delightful. So here it is:

Toronto has a reputation outside of itself of being stuffy, uptight, money-hungry, career-oriented, and maybe even rude—rude for Canada, not New York rude. Let’s not get crazy. Starbucks has a reputation of being also maybe a bit on the uptight side, despite the marketing to make their cafés seem laid back and such, there are people who think of Starbucks as evil. Maybe the same people who don’t like Toronto. I am somewhat ambivalent towards Starbucks as I don’t drink coffee. I like Toronto, though, because I grew up there and it will always be home. I’ve always thought that was kind of a cliché, but it is true. As much as I have no plans to leave Montréal, ever, when I go to Toronto, I’m going home.

So I came home this week, and my first stop after disembarking from the train at Union Station was to meet my brother for lunch. He said he would meet me at Starbucks at Yonge and Adelaide. Never mind that I went to the wrong one—there was a very obvious Starbucks at Yonge and King, just a block away, and the one he was at was hidden away inside some other building—it was good that I did. I got a free cookie.

I was a bit unsure about which one I was supposed to meet him at, and I was half and hour early, so I thought I’d buy a cookie to get some change to call him and let him know I was there. I ordered the cookie and it got put in a bag on the counter. Then, as she was ringing up a sandwich and a San Pellegrino for a woman all Toronto-ed up in her power suit, she casually picked up my cookie, handed it to me and said: “There you go.”

“But I haven’t paid for it,” I protested.

“That’s ok,” she said. “Go ahead.” I thanked her and retreated to the patio to eat my cookie. I didn’t manage to get change, so I sat there waiting for Joe, thinking about why she would have done that. Maybe the $1.35 isn’t worth it—what is the profit margin on a white chocolate macadamia nut cookie?

Later, Joe said, “Was she cute? Did you get her number?” Oh. Well, she wasn’t that cute. I never notice those things. Subtle does not work with me.

There was a guy standing on the street corner wishing the customers a very subtle good day, holding a dirty, empty coffee cup out for tangible evidence of how good a day it might turn out to be. I thought I caught him giving me a knowing look. Then another down and out looking dude showed up on a scooter. He sort of shot me a glance, too. I had had a late night and early morning, I hadn’t shaved in a few days, I was carrying two dusty knapsacks, and wearing a pretty cheap (but actually quite useful) green rain jacket. Maybe they thought I was one of them? Maybe the Starbucks girl had thought I was destitute. But I had pulled out a twenty in order to pay.

I suppose there is no reason to go on thinking about why. People can just be nice, for no reason. I’ve done it. I certainly didn’t enjoy the cookie any less for being confused about its provenance. So, there in the heart of stuffy Toronto, in a stuffy Starbucks no less, a spontaneous act of cookie-kindness (the best kind) took place. Perhaps it was the city welcoming me home, a workaholic parent making up for lost time by buying favours. Maybe that’s an unfair assessment. After all, I’m all grown up, and I can see the city now for what it is, not just what it is to me. The way around all that anti-Toronto propaganda is to come here, and enjoy the city for what it is: still Toronto the Good, if Toronto the Busy. But not too busy to share a cookie.

A goal for Afghansitan

Ok, so clearly people reading this are not into the conspiracy thing. That’s fine. Go on living your lives as if everything you believe is actually true…

Seriously though, there was an interesting article in the New York Times this weekend about the “chattering classes”—essentially a group of critics who have a voice “amplified” by the media. In the article, a blogger, Markos Moulitsas claims that “Absolutely everything and everyone in politics is driven by media today.” Presumably he means “the media,” a distinction I made clear to my ESL class this week, but anyway, his point is that it’s all about looking good.

I disagree. There is a great deal of posturing and massaging of media relations in politics, but in the end, it has to be about implementing your agenda. For example, the Conservative government may have made more middle of the road promises in the election, and they may have succumbed to the idea of a “debate” on Afghanistan—but that doesn’t mean they care what people think.

During this so-called debate, Jack Layton threw back a bunch of questions the Defence Minister had himself asked of the Liberals last session:

“"What are the goals and objectives of the mission and how do they meet our foreign-policy objectives? What is the mandate, what is the defined concept of operations, what is the effective command and control structure, what are the rules of engagement?" Mr. Layton asked, quoting Mr. O'Connor.”

In response, O’Connor called Layton and his party “anti-war.” Those questions don’t seem anti-war to me, they seem like questions that should be answered before a military mission is sent off. O’Connor’s supposed answers—

"Events in Bali, Madrid and London have all showed how vulnerable we are to terrorism," he said. "Must we wait for terrorists to appear in Vancouver, Montreal or here in Ottawa before we recognize the very real threat that they present to our security?”

—don’t make sense. The tired refrain of a potential terrorist attack in Canada doesn’t cut it. I don’t mean to sound naïve—and that is what the powers that be in Western governments (Canada, U.S.A., Britain) are playing on: the fear we could be next—but is there any real possibility of attacks taking place here? London is an important world city. Madrid was in the midst of an election being fought on whether or not Spain should stay in the war. Bali seems so out of the way as to be banal, but I’m sure there must be some connection. Anyway, what is our place in the hierarchy of the world? Pretty darned low. So, then, is the likelihood of a terrorist attack on us.

Of course, if we do choose to get involved, our stock on the potential terrorist target could rise. Michael Ignatieff makes a good point that he has been to Afghanistan pre- and post-Taliban. Apparently life there is better now. There are good things to be fought for over there. But if that is the case, the Defence Minister needs to say so. He needs to relate the goals of the mission to our foreign policy objectives. If achieving better treatment of women in the 3rd world is part of our foreign policy, then say so, and say that’s why we are in Afghanistan. But don’t say it’s because if we don’t go there, terrorists might attack Vancouver.

I certainly don’t expect to hear from the Defence Minister that we are in Afghanistan because the Conservatives and their friends are sympathetic to the American military-industrial complex and can stand to make some money out of it. That’s too much honesty for even the chattering classes to ask for. But a little direction would be good. A little justification, not self-righteous chest pounding, and fear-mongering, should be the product of this debate.

9/11 Conspiracy Theory--yes, but what are you going to do about it?

People always ask, “where were you when it happened?” On September 11, 2001, the so-called Kennedy Assassination of our day, I was in Fredericton, New Brunswick. Sorry, that’s all I got. I don’t remember the exact moment right off the top of my head. I was probably at home, goofing off on the computer, and someone probably called me to tell me something about airplanes and skyscrapers and terrorists. It was probably my dad who called.

I have to admit my first thoughts upon “seeing the towers fall,” as they say of that moment that has so defined world politics since, was that it sure looked like a controlled demolition. I also remember thinking that the cell phone calls from airline passengers were suspicious seeing as how you couldn’t make a clear cell phone call from an airplane back in 2001. All the people on TV that day and shortly after (I remember watching CNN in an East Side Mario’s restaurant in Halifax after running my first university cross-country meet in two years—no, the meet wasn’t cancelled.) said they thought they saw a helicopter around the Pentagon, and thought they heard an explosion, like a missile. I put all this together and I thought, yeah, sounds like a government-planned “terrorist event” designed to consolidate a neo-conservative agenda.

In the days that followed, the media’s focus shifted, and I, like most others, were convinced that an evil little man named Osama had masterminded all of this. So, what is more likely? My story above—a government conspiracy—or that it was all the doing of one man, organised from a hospital bed in the far reaches of the world, as a bit of revenge for the big, bad American culture blitz in oil country?

Dylan Avery, in his movie Loose Change, proposes that it is more likely an inside job. In fact, I didn’t really think all of those things on September 11th, or even on the 12th or 13th. They all come from his film, a very credible and believable documentary that zeros in on certain claims the U.S. government has made, and tries to expose them as false. He does a good job. I’m convinced.

But then again, I’m a conspiracy buff, and I wanted to be convinced. A better test would a sceptic, someone who normally scoffs at such things. If you have been scoffing up to now, that person is you. Watch the movie. See what you think. This is not a Michael Moore-esque rant. This is no personality attached, looking for the truth, investigative reporting at it's best. Avery's blog chronicles the fallout from the film. Researchers have been killed. Seriously.

A friend of mine, upon my telling her about this theory, refused to believe that the American government would do such a horrible thing. People aren’t really that bad, she said. Here’s the thing. Someone did it. Someone had those planes (either filled with people or military drones, it doesn’t matter) flown into the two biggest buildings in the biggest city in the world. Why is it so much more believable that Osama could be so evil, but Dick Cheney could not? Let me suggest a reason: it is easier to think Osama did it because Osama is a brown man.

Clearly the status of Arabs in North American media has deteriorated since 9/11, but even before then, a systemic racism existed in the U.S.A. (and Canada, let’s not kid ourselves). I’m not going to trot out any stats to prove this racism. If you don’t believe it, you are naïve. If you are not white, you know it. If you are white, ask any friend who isn’t. Ask ten of them and see how many say, no, man, I get treated just like you, the colour of my skin don’t mean shit, yo! Ok, tongue-in-cheek there, but also, case-in-point.

It is the easiest sell the American government ever had to make. “The butler did it” is so Victorian. Welcome to the 21st century: the brown man did it, in the air, with a plane.