Ilegal dope vs tobacco - mixed messages (and lying scumbag politicians)

Today the Supreme Court of Canada ruled (unanimously) that Vancouver's "supervised drug injection" site ('Insite') can stay open:

To force the site to close “would have been to prevent injection drug users from accessing the health services offered by Insite, threatening the health and indeed the lives of potential clients,” Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin wrote in the ruling. 

It thereby constitutes a limit on the section 7 charter rights of drug addicts - life, liberty and the security of person.

So the Supremes ruled that enabling illicit dopers is good for their health, life, liberty and security.

Then we have another class of (legal) users - smokers, who have been attacked mercilessly and kicked while they're down.  In BC the health minister is now threatening smokers with another kick - forcing them to pay higher health fees:

“Some people, in B.C. about 14 per cent of the population, continue to smoke and they’re going to cost more,” de Jong said in an interview. “Maybe they should contribute more.”

Civil liberties and ethics experts think it's a crappy idea, primarily on "slippery slope" grounds. As far as I know, no one wondered if it might be unenforceable.

Also, Minister De Jong neglected to point out that the government is already taxing smokers to death:

The province collected $682 million from tobacco taxation in the 2009-10 fiscal year, $708 million in 2008-09 and $692 million in 2007-08.

That probably more than covers additional health costs. And I'm sure that De Jong would prefer that no one mentioned any studies like this one in the New England Journal of Medicine which found:

... In our study, lifetime costs for smokers can be calculated as $72,700 among men and $94,700 among women, and lifetime costs among nonsmokers can be calculated as $83,400 and $111,000, respectively. This amounts to lifetime costs for nonsmokers that are higher by 15 percent among men and 18 percent among women.

Altogether this spells "CASH GRAB" from (and harassment of) smokers to offset the cost of enabling dopers.

Orwellian food fascism

The Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute (CAPI) has produced a new report. Predictably it's loaded with fashionable eco-buzzwords and bureaucratic bullcrap.  From Peter Foster's scathing critique:

... a steaming shovel-ready pile of policy titled Canada’s Agri-Food Destination, which amounts to a non-fiction rewrite of Animal Farm for the 21st century: a self-parody of bureaucratic pretension.

... The CAPI report produces grand Soviet-style targets before getting down to the nitty-gritty of planting new gobbledegook-fertilized bureaucracies as far as the eye can see.

... three pieces of numerical mysticism, two anti-economic mercantilist fallacies and subscription to an established policy disaster before we’ve even left the first page of the executive summary.

... The path to agri-nirvana requires five bureaucratic “Enablers of Change.” ...

... Here is the media’s role: “Link the important issues to prompt change ... [as for global warming, eco-brainwashing and badgering]

... It’s uncertain what the Harper government thinks of this Liberal-created bureaucratic monstrosity or its latest report.

And you can't miss Mr. Foster's exasperation with it all in his closing recommendation:

... [Federal Agriculture Minister Gerry] Ritz should take the whole organization, now ensconced in pseudo-agricultural splendor on the grounds of Ottawa’s legendary experimental farm, out to a more remote rural location with a long gun and a shovel.

Bravo, Peter!

Lowering the bar

Disgusting! Downtown Victoria on a Friday night:

... The square is also where city workers ... are chaining a portable urinal to a lamppost, having just unloaded it from a truck. They do this every Thursday, Friday and Saturday night, dropping the grey plastic pillars at four locations downtown.

Around 4 a.m., once the last of the strays have weaved home from the bars, they haul the urinals away again.

The portables are four-holers, with places to stand on each side. Few seem deterred by the fact that the standees are wide open to view by passersby, at least from behind. The city truck hasn't even pulled out of the square when the first customer unzips.

Within five minutes there are seven more, including two homeless men, a pedi-cab driver and a group of young bucks whose dolled-up dates are less than impressed. A steady parade of club-goers flows past, some gawking, some not.

The city estimates the urinals are utilized 24,000 times a year, at a cost of $70,000.

On Thursday, Victoria council unveiled plans for a permanent $40,000 outdoor urinal that will provide more privacy, a curving screen giving it the look of Toronto City Hall.

Me, I say if they really want to stop public urination, they don't need cops with ticket books, they need grandmothers with wooden spoons. Or, better yet, grannies with Tasers. [That’s funny but, realistically, the cops should be doing their damn jobs - arresting or ticketing offenders (and publishing their names), which might lead to ...]

... a change in attitude by drunken doofuses who think a night out is an excuse to discard all common decency.

[...]

Victoria has been, as are no doubt many other cities, encouraging bad behaviour on its streets. Vagrancy, panhandling, drug and alcohol use, public urination and you-name-it are met with outrage by most of the citizenry. But the "authorities" response, more often than not, isn’t to discourage the behaviour but to tacitly approve by either ignoring or actively enabling it. Vagrancy and panhandling are ‘tolerated’, needle disposals and exchanges are provided for users and instead of ticketing and arresting drunks and yobs for pissing in public the city spends many thousands of dollars providing disgusting street urinals. It’s idiocy.

Free parking for stolen shopping carts

‘The Major’ is irked by a ridiculous Victoria city council ruling:

... I opened my beloved Times Colonist to read that city hall will build parking spots for shopping carts used by the homeless to prevent cluttering up the avenues ...

... To sum up: The only free parking spots in Victoria will be for stolen shopping carts due to the large number of them ... er, stolen.

... A dear friend of mine owns several up-scale markets carrying such items as the rare outflow mushroom or organic-bunny key chains.

He, at great cost, had special shopping carts built that allowed for giant cups of coffee to be held safely, with a small passenger seat for the heir apparent to swaddle in.

To walk with him through the streets is to hear the sound of castanets as his teeth begin to chatter at the sight of one of his carts being pushed through traffic by someone whose eyes are spinning like a fruit machine whilst carrying a small but equally perturbed friend.

Each cart cost $400 and much to his chagrin, his insurance company has long stopped taking his calls.

Victoria city council and the media spend more time worrying about and enabling the bad behaviour of the city’s dysfunctional underclass, than anything else. Parking for stolen shopping carts is one of the loonier examples. Then there’s free crack pipes, needle exchanges and camping in the city’s parks.

Enabling addicts

The Vancouver Island Health Authority (VIHA) just revealed that it has agreed to shell out $2 million for a building to house a new needle "exchange". VIHA is doing this, in part, to solve a problem resulting from the existing Victoria needle exchange’s eviction due to the filthy, noisy and criminal behaviour of its 1500 "clients". The location of proposed new facility came as a surprise to the neighbourhood:

St. Andrew's elementary schoolchildren in their blue tartan uniforms will pass by drug addicts and pushers on their way to the playground after Victoria's needle exchange moves into the neighbourhood this summer.

"We're very concerned we've received no information before this went public," Pollard [the principal] said. "The safety of the children is our primary concern."

The needle exchange will be adjacent to the newly constructed Our Place homeless drop-in centre, near the Victoria Conservatory of Music, across from a busy McDonald's restaurant and kitty-corner to the private Catholic school.

VIHA is involved because the prevailing orthodoxy on how to deal with dope addicts is "harm reduction" and treating addiction primarily as a health issue. For now this mostly means ensuring that addicts get all the clean drug paraphernalia they need. Though the problems and concerns noted above hardly represent harm reduction for the neighbourhood. And the next step is, of course (though VIHA denies it), safe injection sites where users can shoot up in comfort under the supervision of medical staff.

Overall, the ‘strategy’ effectively makes it easier for addicts to remain addicted. Clean needles, nice facilities and friendly service amount to tacit approval and enabling of drug use. This is somehow supposed to solve the problem of addiction; but, as might reasonably be expected, the number of addicts continues to grow. One supposes the dope suppliers and pushers are very happy with the approach.

The "authorities" have clearly bought into the concept. How do the little people feel?

Enabling the destruction of a neighbourhood

Further to the previous post here’s an excellent description of how the Victoria needle exchange has wrecked a neighbourhood:

For those of us who observe the devastation of a neighbourhood in the name of a social experiment, resentment is focused not on the unfortunates, but on those who planned and implemented this disaster, including our mayor and council.

This on a day that started with me scooping diarrhea embedded with needles off my front steps.

Used needles, human feces, discarded underwear, assorted condoms and other unsanitary byproducts of addiction are frequently deposited on properties in the neighbourhood.

...for a 70-year-old pensioner who grew up in a city where she once walked fearlessly, it is utterly disheartening.

...many senior citizens, some handicapped, live here. Many are unable to sleep at night, never mind take a walk. They are intimidated by the arguments and yelling, the confrontations and their increasing fears of violence.

The needle exchange is a gathering place for addicts and the predators that they inevitably attract.

...the predictable consequences of "injecting" a crime-prone subculture into what was once a beautiful, pleasant and safe neighborhood.

Also predictable is the silence and inaction of the mayor and council on the citizens’ plight. Silent, that is, except to call for more needle exchanges and safe injection sites which will create an even bigger mess. Their deep ‘caring’ for addicts doesn’t extend to the real victims here.

I don’t suppose the bleeding hearts will ever understand that their ‘caring’ will never help an addict who only cares about the next fix. In fact the ONLY way an addict will ever get around to quitting dope is to care enough about himself to try. With the city making it easier to use dope that becomes less, not more, likely.

Stop enabling drug abusers

Victoria has a needle exchange located in a busy downtown area. I drive by it every day. It's always an eyesore - littered with trash, feces and dopers hanging out or sleeping in the doorways.

Though the mayor and council are cronic, bleeding heart enablers, a sizeable proportion of the populace have their heads screwed on right.

According to this poll two thirds want the needle exchange gone.

Victoria, world-class enabler

enabler: one who enables another to persist in self-destructive behavior (as substance abuse) by providing excuses or by making it possible to avoid the consequences of such behavior.

Victoria is a beautiful spot -- scenic, temperate climate and a city offering most amenities along with a laid-back life-style -- all the reasons I moved here a dozen years ago.

These are the same reasons most people are attracted to Victoria. But, as well as productive citizens it has also attracted a substantial underclass of alcoholics, drug addicts, panhandlers, vagrants, youthful able-bodied ‘free spirits’ - most if not all of whom are homeless. Over the years it’s been hard not to notice the growing numbers of chronically dysfunctional people inhabiting the down-town streets and parks and gathering around the many facilities aimed at 'helping' them.

And, while it’s difficult not to notice the growing underclass, it’s nearly impossible not to notice the growth of a ‘poverty’ industry that clamours for ever more ‘help’ for the poor souls on the street. It’s a rare day that there isn’t a headlined story in the newspaper, a radio or TV talk-show or other media event highlighting the problem and appealing for help. In today’s local paper there’s a full four page advertising section detailing the ‘Our Place Society’s programs and asking for donations. And to hear the mayor and council going on about it one gets the impression it’s the only issue on their agenda.

‘Help’ includes soup kitchens, food banks, street outreach, drop-in centres, shelters, needle exchanges and just this week it was announced that the BC Health Minister will recommend approval for three ‘safe’ injection sites in Victoria. Vancouver has one. Victoria needs three?

It seems logical that, as a basic rule of thumb, the easier you make it for people to lead a dysfunctional, parasitic life, the more dysfunctional, parasitic people there will be. More facilities for street denizens will lead to more people living on the street. So, you might ask, how’s it really working out in Victoria? What are the numbers? Is there objective evidence that the city’s strategy of enabling dysfunctional behaviour is yielding more of it?

Yes there is! In 2005 the Victoria Cool Aid Society did a comprehensive survey to find out how many street people or ‘homeless’ there were. The count was 668 region-wide. The survey was repeated in 2007. The new count was 1242. That’s an increase of 85% in just two years - and bear in mind that for Victoria these are economic boom times with very low unemployment and ‘now hiring’ signs plastered in the windows of many, many businesses.

Now don’t get me wrong. Many of these street people, especially the addicts and the otherwise mentally challenged, certainly need help (beginning with an attempt to help themselves). And the people trying to help them have their hearts in the right place:) But you sure have ask whether a strategy of enabling bad behaviour, a strategy that attracts ever more troubled people to the streets, is the right one.

Victoria is unlikely to change its approach any time soon. It's a world-class enabler. So I predict the Cool Aid Society’s 2009 homeless survey will yield another big jump in the numbers.