As a tadpole, I was taught that the period from the fall of Rome to the Renaissance was a time of ignorance occasioned by the loss of classical knowledge and a lack of inquiring spirit. It may not have been entirely so, but the very name of Dark Ages could occasion intellectual and emotional shivers, particularly in the context of the enlightened times in which we were living.
As I have looked progressively deeper into the wheels and levers that drive and direct our society, I am struck by the sheer volume of knowledge that we have developed in recent decades, as well as by a dearth of the wisdom to channel the use of said knowledge. In particular, recent developments at both the Federal and Provincial levels of administration lead me to believe that we have come to value ignorance and to reward avidity to the point of self-destruction. There is much talk out there about Harper’s war on knowledge and on those who seem able to draw coherent conclusions from the mounds of data.
The Galloping Beaver has this to say…
Owen Gray at Northern Reflections muses…
And now there’s this business of Chuck Strahl moving out of the oversight of our security organizations directly into lobbying for Enbridge:
This move by Strahl is simply an admission of his advocacy all along, that he’s been working for Enbridge and not for the Canadian public, but using publicly-funded organizational framework for the benefit of a major corporation that, contrary to anything that the Environmental Review Panel may have said in this instance, does nothing in the public interest.
Honesty? Good management? Transparency? None of that from any political party that I can see (with the possible exception of the now-doubled Green caucus).
And, just for good measure, and because I like this stuff:
(The irony of the header image is that it’s title relates to the results of good government. Ha!)