The Mackenzie Valley natural gas pipeline would rank among Canada's biggest private infrastructure projects ever undertaken. It would cost $7-billion to build, require a building crew of 13,000 construction workers at peak, and snake 1,220 kilometres from Inuvik, above the Arctic Circle, south, following the east side of the Mackenzie River to northern Alberta.

But the pipe that would turn millions of acres of tundra and boreal forest into potentially lucrative oil and gas concessions has been on the planning table before.

[. . . . ] Regulators in the Northwest Territories and Ottawa are preparing to review the project . . . .

[. . . . ] The mighty project is on the drawing board only because of demand of even more enormous proportions. North American gas supplies are declining, and imports -- still less than 2% of the 68 billion cubic feet of natural gas the continent consumes daily -- are limited by such factors as coastal community opposition to the billion-dollar terminals needed to receive the liquefied gas as it arrives by tanker, and the long-term investment required.

[. . . . ] But ironically, the 1.2 billion cubic feet of gas a day the Mackenzie line would deliver by 2010 (1.9 billion cubic feet with relatively modest improvements, and new supplies found) are likely to do little to ease home heating bills and the price of electricity.

New heavy oil extraction and refining development slated for Alberta's oilsands in the province's northwest is liable to create a massive increased demand for natural gas by the end of the decade, and suck up the bulk of the new supply.

[. . . . ] But one First Nations band could still scupper the plan.

[. . . . ] But the Deh Cho, who claim some 40% of the land the pipeline must travel, remain at odds with Ottawa. And they have threatened to scupper the development plan if Ottawa does not meet their terms.

[. . . . ] So earlier this fall the band filed a legal injunction to stop federal agencies from reviewing the pipeline's regulatory application.

Imperial says it will press on despite the Deh Cho's opposition. "We are moving ahead on the regulatory side. I'm not going to get in the middle of something that is between the federal government and the Deh Cho," says Tim Hearn, CEO of Imperial.

And he may not have to.

[. . . . ] Andy Scott, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, is negotiating directly with Mr. Norwegian. Though neither side will say exactly what they are aiming for, if success is reached it will likely be through interim measures, rather than a wholesale settlement.

"We have seen interim agreements reached between governments and Aboriginal groups in the Northwest Territories to allow for resource sharing and resource management in advance of settlements -- we have seen this particularly in the instances of developing the two diamond mines," says David Millett, who oversees the comprehensive claims process in Canada's territories for the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs. [. . . . ]

"The federal government is looking at bypassing Parliament by ending the practice of having self-government agreements with First Nations ratified by MPs"

Such a move would allow land claims to be approved through regulation without the lengthy Parliamentary debate involved in passing a bill through the House of Commons and the Senate. Regulations are rarely reviewed by MPs and have only been overturned by Parliament in a handful of cases. [. . . . ]

There are lots of problems with a public health care system like Canada's, most of which we hear about on a regular basis. Waiting lists for diagnostic procedures and surgeries are too long. The lists of available general practitioners are too short. And the whole blessed enterprise is costing the government (and therefore taxpayers) far too much money.

But disturbing as these troubles are, they aren't the worst consequences of a socialized health care operation. That distinction is reserved for a subtler, but nonetheless incredibly invidious, result of socialized medicine: it provides a never-ending justification for government to dictate how people must live their lives.

[. . . . ] But with health care, Canadians are not even granted the opportunity to decide whether they'd rather shell out for doctors and hospitals themselves in return for having the autonomy to make important life choices.

Instead, every Canadian is born into the losing end of a lousy bargain: society will do a mediocre job of taking care of your health care needs, and you will let society decide whether and what you smoke, what and how much you eat, when and where you drink, which leisure activities you participate in and how you protect yourself when you do.

At the end of the day, it is this curtailment of individual freedom that is the most objectionable aspect of Canada's socialized health care regime.

two gangs of youth had pepper sprayed each other inside and outside the McDonald's restaurant just outside the mall. Burnaby RCMP Sergeant Garry Begg said a gang member entered the McDonald's, where the rival gang had taken shelter, and blasted one of the youth. A member of the rival gang took out a canister of bear spray and blasted back, spreading the fumes quickly and emptying the restaurant within seconds. Sgt. Begg said a gang member from outside then blasted his rivals as they fled. [. . . . ]

Part of the job is to persuade people that whatever their views on marijuana, grow houses are a problem, especially if one shows up next door, Supt. Ogden said.

Police say hydroponic marijuana is a Canadian growth industry grown out of control.

There are so many grow houses in neighbourhoods across the country that officers leading the fight are focusing on large, gang-run operations and resigning themselves to seeing countless others go untouched. [. . . . ]

Buyer beware

Clues for spotting houses formerly used as marijuana grow-ops, from Victor Kerman of Royal LePage Signature Realty: . . . .

December 29, 2004 -- THIS month the National Academy of Sciences issued a 328-page report on gun-control laws. The big news is that the academy's panel couldn't identify any benefits of decades-long effort to reduce crime and injury by restricting gun ownership. The only conclusion it could draw was: Let's study the question some more (presumably, until we find the results we want).

The academy, however, should believe its own findings. Based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, a survey that covered 80 different gun-control measures and some of its own empirical work, the panel couldn't identify a single gun-control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide or accidents. [. . . . ]

When it comes to global influence, Canada’s Montreal-based Power Corporation is an octopus with tentacles everywhere.

Both Prime Minister Paul Martin and his mentor Maurice Strong, senior advisor to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, worked for Power Corp.

Martin’s immediate predecessor is former Prime Minister Jean Chretien, whose daughter, France is married to Andre Desmarais, son of Power Corp’s founding father, Paul Desmarais.

Desmarais Sr. is a major shareholder and director of TotalFinaElf, the biggest oil corporation in France, which has held tens of billions of dollars in contracts with the deposed regime of Saddam Hussein.

As Canada Free Press (CFP) revealed last week, Paul Volcker, who heads up the Independent Inquiry Commission into the oil-for-food scandal, held a seat on Power Corp’s international advisory board.

OTTAWA - China's intelligence services have systematically targeted Canada's science and technology sectors and use Chinese students and visiting scientists to steal technology for military use and to enhance the country's global economic competitiveness, a senior intelligence source says.

In its annual report to Parliament, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service warns foreign spies are seeking to acquire ''Canada's scientific and technological developments, critical economic and information infrastructure, military and other classified information, putting at risk Canada's national security.''

CSIS does not cite a specific country, but a high-level intelligence source identifies China as the ''most aggressive'' in seeking to illegally acquire Canadian technology. [. . . . ]

The manual [Chinese spying ], Sources and Methods of Obtaining National Defence Science and Technology Intelligence, said Beijing set up a database of ''famous scientists'' overseas and describes how ''special methods'' are used to obtain classified information through ''satellite surveillance, electronic bugging, special agent activities [buying or stealing], etc.''

* China Emerging as U.S. Rival for Canada's Oil

* China Set To Buy Up Canada's Resources

* China and trust: Let's examine the past duplicitous actions of China Minmetals in Canada before we let the state-run entity take over Noranda Special to the Financial Post; Northern Miner, December 23, 2004, by MP David Kilgour -- excellent and well-researched -- or see the the original article here

North Korea's Kim Jong Il has purged some of his closest relatives, accusing them of trying to seize power, reports in Beijing and Seoul said.

[. . . . ] Kim Jong Il took over from his father 10 years ago and managed to hold on to power as the economy collapsed and an estimated three million perished from hunger and disease.

The regime is being supported largely with aid from China and South Korea as Kim has tried to trade his nuclear weapons programme with sweeping security guarantees from Washington. [. . . . ]

[A] vicious power struggle seems under way.

Not long after the purge, Kim Jong Il paid an official visit to China and, around the time of his return, there was a huge train explosion at Ryonchon, close to the Chinese border. Official reports said it was an accident and that Kim's train had passed through hours before, but there are persistent rumours that he escaped by only 20 minutes. Whatever the truth, diplomatic sources say Kim has been treating the train explosion as an attempt to kill him. He has dismissed senior officials responsible for his safety, including the interior minister in charge of internal security, and ordered the confiscation of all mobile phones in May this year. A mobile phone is thought to have been used to set off the explosion.

A further puzzle has been Kim's decision to remove his portrait from a number of public places where foreign delegations are received.

Chinese sources also claim a growing flight of senior and middle-ranking officials and generals, with one report alleging as many as 130 generals have sought refuge in China.

Canada's military disaster response team must wait for an official request from the Department of Foreign Affairs before it can be sent to help victims of a tsunami in Southeast Asia.

While other nations had teams already in the air yesterday to help with the aftermath of the deadly tidal wave, defence spokesmen said the Canadian Forces' Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) will not be going anywhere without the proper paperwork.

"A formal request would have to be made by the Department of Foreign Affairs to the Department of National Defence," John Morris, a spokesman for the Defence Department, said yesterday.

"To date, we have not received a formal request for our assets at this time."
Bill Graham, the Defence Minister, said the military teams will remain on standby for now, awaiting a formal request from one or more of the governments in the region hit by the tsunami. [. . . . ]

We haven't exported tolerance nearly as often as we've imported intolerance. We haven't strengthened individual liberties in other regions nearly as much as we've reduced them at home. Today, we're less free to speak, associate, do business, choose pastimes or lifestyles than we were 50 ago (except in matters having to do with promiscuity or sexual preference).

The author of Behzti (the Punjabi word meaning dishonour or shame) is in hiding. News agencies reported last week that Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti had fled her home on the advice of the police. The law's counsel came after a theatre that was to present Ms. Bhatti's black comedy had abandoned further performances, following an attempt on Dec. 18 by hundreds of violent Sikh protesters to storm the building.

The riot caused considerable property damage. Five police officers were hurt and 600 patrons had to be evacuated. Later, a spokesman from the Guru Nanak Gurdwara temple, Mohan Singh, was quoted welcoming the theatre's decision to cancel the production, regretting only that the management had not considered Sikh concerns about the play when they were expressed earlier.

Readers who might think this happened somewhere on the Indian subcontinent would be wrong. It happened in central England. It was the Birmingham Repertory Theatre that cancelled further performances of Ms. Bhatti's play and the Birmingham constabulary that advised the author to flee.

None of this should surprise Canadians. After all, it was in Montreal, not somewhere in the Levant, that the authorities at Concordia University were intimidated into cancelling two scheduled speakers, former Israeli prime ministers Benjamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak. And it wasn't in Falluja but in Toronto, at York University, where those who came to hear American scholar Daniel Pipes had to have their venue shifted from a campus pub to a curtained-off corner of a basketball court for their own security. [. . . . ]

[. . . . ] Very few of the 192 "united nations" on earth recognize, or respect, the inherent rights of their own people, and certainly have no respect for the rights of people in other nations. That's why suicide bombers can blow up a bus full of women and children in Tel Aviv, or innocent civilians in a Baghdad market.

As the collective voice and spirit of the people of America, the United States government should abandon its efforts to achieve peace on earth through the United Nations. Instead, the United States should extend an invitation to men of goodwill everywhere who will engage in systematic communications in search of reasonable ways to voluntarily respect and honor the inherent rights of all people — which is the only route to peace on earth. [. . . . ]

Ever since I was a child, I've heard a range of accounts of what happened to the Palestinians and Palestine. Everyone knows the Jewish version and the Arab version. But there is a third side, that of those who lived there and still do -- the Israeli Arabs.

Some Jews want us out of Israel, and some Arabs believe that we are an extension of the Zionists. Yet we Israeli Arabs keep our culture and traditions. Mahshy, or stuffed grape leaves, remains our favorite meal. We love Arabic music; we sing old folk songs, including "Wein aa Ramallah" about a famous Palestinian city, and songs from all over the Arab world. We are unique among the Arabs, though. We have vested interests on both sides -- and are angry at both sides.

Israeli Arabs have lived alongside Jews for as long as this generation can remember. [. . . . ]

The odd thing in our national politics is the disconnect between what is said by our political leaders and what is the undeniable reality surrounding us.

As an illustration, a Canadian prime minister speaking about the virtue, even necessity, of UN reforms would be not only proper given Canada's role in its founding in 1945, but would carry much deserving weight if he spoke candidly about its present dismal reality.

Ottawa has gone mute, however, when it comes to the abysmal scandal gripping the UN. It is as if, despite our resources to be informed, we are oblivious to the largest money scam in history operated out of the world body. [. . . . ]

Annan by any measure is hugely discredited. His record is appalling. He has been at the centre of failed UN missions from Somalia and Bosnia to the criminal tragedies of Rwanda and Darfur, has shown no leadership on the most compelling post-Cold War security issue of global terrorism, and presides over a scandal in which his son, Kojo Annan, allegedly profited because of connections.

But as the head of the UN bureaucracy, Annan knows he is protected.

Now if only a Canadian prime minister would insist on restoring the good name of the UN by speaking out against those who have sullied it.

A NEW U.S. law revamping that country's intelligence system will send thousands of new agents to the Canadian border and help intensify their tracking and deportation of aliens. The legislation authorizes the department of homeland security to hire 10,000 border patrol agents, who will be added at a rate of 2,000 yearly from 2006 to 2010. The Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 also orders 20% -- or 2,000 -- of the new agents to be assigned along the border.

The act, which was signed into law by U.S. President George W. Bush two weeks ago, orders the addition of 4,000 new Customs and immigration agents at a rate of 800 annually from 2006. Hundreds of those officers will be posted along the Canadian border. The department must also add 40,000 new beds for aliens facing deportation. About 8,000 beds yearly will be added from 2006.

THE RCMP and Customs agents have arrested three suspected drug couriers who they claim were trying to slip into Pearson airport among a rush of Christmas travellers. A London-area couple and a female student were nabbed on Christmas Eve after arriving on separate flights from Jamaica, police said.

"People think just because we are busy we have dropped our vigilance," said Patrizia Giolti, of the Canada Border Services Agency. "Our vigilance has been heightened."

Giolti said a couple from Landsborough were arrested after 22 kilos of hash oil, worth $795,200, was found in plastic containers allegedly containing Jamaica's world-famous molasses. [. . . . ]

THE FEDERAL government is hiding a flurry of activity about biometrics within the citizenship and immigration department by stalling the release of documents, the Opposition charges. The citizenship and immigration department is seeking a 571-day extension on an Access to Information request by Sun Media about the use of biometrics between January and November 2004.

Biometrics has been a controversial issue for the Liberals, and the government has shied away from bringing in widespread use of fingerprinting and iris scans.

[. . . . ] The Access to Information officer overseeing the file said the "very large request," which involves several branches of the department, is to blame for the lengthy delay.

Conservative MP Diane Ablonczy called the extension "ridiculous."

"The word 'stonewalling' certainly comes to mind and also it's a clear contravention of the Access to Information Act, which was supposed to help ensure that governments would be transparent, open and accountable," said Ablonczy, who sat on the committee when it studied biometrics. [. . . . ]

[. . . . ] Under the Safe Third Country Agreement, set to take effect Wednesday in Canada and the United States, applicants will have to make refugee claims in the country where they first land - a more difficult prospect if it's the U.S.

Refugees find it easier to reach the United States and then travel to Canada because the U.S. receives international flights from more countries. [. . . . ]

TORONTO - Two men used bedsheets to climb from the third-storey window of a Toronto immigration detention centre on Christmas Day, the third time inmates have escaped from the facility since May, police said yesterday.

After climbing to the ground, the two men ran to a vehicle waiting for them in a nearby parking lot. Their escape was reportedly caught on security camera.

A third man also fled the facility on Christmas Day, though police could not say how he made his escape.

The three men -- two Costa Ricans and a Hungarian -- were reportedly awaiting deportation after failing to leave Canada once their visas expired. [. . . . ]

But the profoundly important human sense of control over one's own destiny, once taken away, can never be fully or adequately returned. Sadly, it's a lesson more and more generations of Canadians are beginning to learn.

There are lots of problems with a public health care system like Canada's, most of which we hear about on a regular basis. Waiting lists for diagnostic procedures and surgeries are too long. The lists of available general practitioners are too short. And the whole blessed enterprise is costing the government (and therefore taxpayers) far too much money.

But disturbing as these troubles are, they aren't the worst consequences of a socialized health care operation. That distinction is reserved for a subtler, but nonetheless incredibly invidious, result of socialized medicine: it provides a never-ending justification for government to dictate how people must live their lives. [. . . . ]

The Fraser Institute notes that a married man supporting a wife and two children on $50,000 per year can expect to pay about $4,600 in federal taxes. A family in which two partners each earn $25,000 will pay only about $2,100. Equal income, double taxes.

Last week, I described the dangers posed by Canada's low fertility rate: 1.5, less than three-quarters the number necessary to replace the existing population. (That column can be found in the 2004 archive of my Web site, www.davidfrum.com.) This week, it's time to talk about answers.

Children are expensive. Many governments -- including Canada's -- try to help parents raise them with subsidies and support. Canada, for example, offers a large monthly per-child cash payment to poor parents and a smaller per-child payment to middle-income parents.

Most of the provinces offer subsidized daycare programs. Ottawa is now considering a national daycare program. Federal tax policy already allows parents to deduct up to $7,000 per year per child in childcare expenses.

These policies cost substantial sums of money. Plainly, though, they are not working. [. . . . ]

According to the author of Privatization Zealotry (Privatization Zealotry ), Marty Solomon, the only way to make a major improvement in our educational system is NOT through privatization. He believes there is NOT any one answer to the problems in the public school system, regardless of how beneficial independent administration might prove. This is because he feels that NO school can adequately address the socio/economic situations that reflect a certain percentage of students who make up the attendance in any one school.

But schools CAN address certain socio-economic disadvantages, depending on how they are structured. For instance, I just read about a school, the Academy of Alternatives (Academy of Alternatives)
, which, "is accredited for special, alternative and private education." The school is broadening its focus to include, "drug and alcohol education, anger management, conflict-resolution, and life skills." What caught my attention is that there are five students per classroom! This benefits the students because of the individualized instructional setting. In addition, students need only attend school for three hours to get credit for a full day of school. Hours usually reserved for school can be used to work and earn income or get medical or special-education services. [. . . . ]