New Media

Saddam Hussein is dead.

Plenty of people in the Middle East and at least one cranky Vancouverite seem a little choked up that Iraqis in Baghdad had the bad taste to dance in the streets as the old dictator’s corpse was still hanging from the gallows.

Will Saddam’s death make a dent in the chaos in Iraq? Hopefully yes, but probably not. And if the country’s fragile democracy falls to thugs and demagogues like the old Weimar Republic that ultimately gave way to the Nazis, the US will count the brutal tyrant’s demise as it’s only achieved mission objective.

That’s a $354 billion (and counting) whacking.

At least things in Iraq can only get better. Well, one can hope.

A Russian spy is nabbed by our own security services in Montreal, with three passports, three cellphones, five currencies and a bad attitude (Story here). It turns out, he’s been here for 10 years already, up to nothing good, no doubt.

No time in the clink for this spook, though. We’re deporting Paul William Hampel (well, that’s the name we have, anyway, Mr. Spy Guy) straight back to Mother Russia.

With the recent poisoning of Russian spy Victor Litvinenko in London, likely ordered by the Kremlin and carried out by the same organization Litvinenko left, Vladimir Putin’s Russia seems to have evolved into the Soviet Union 2.0.

So why did we go so easy on Hampel by deporting him? The only reason I can think of is that Moscow might have a wayward CSIS agent to trade. Otherwise, we should have at least held on to the guy until we knew his real name.

Canada’s future lies with Asia. Once again, we’re reminded that Vancouver is our northern nation’s gateway to the Pacific Rim.

Our national economy could get a $230 billion boost by 2020, with half a million new jobs to go along with that, a new BC government study says. All we have to do is put the (huge sum of) money into port and freight infrastructure so we can handle all the traffic.

We’re likely to see lots of articles on this topic over 2007. The feds have put aside $590 million for the Pacific Gateway project, with more boatloads of cash on the way.

Let’s just hope that by 2020, our trading partners on the other side of the big pond are as interested in being respectable business partners as well as making a pile of money. The latest on China as of this morning is that 41,500 organ transplants are unaccounted for, between 2001 and 2006. The allegations are still flying that China has transformed its gulag archipelago into an organ-harvesting plant, with Falun Gong practitioners and political prisoners providing the raw materials for the lucrative trade.

By all means, let’s trade with the world and get rich. Even better would be to get rich without having to deal with a country where Googling “human rights” and “democracy” gets you put on a watchlist.

Vancouver real estate, Canada’s mission in Afghanistan, the rise of Stephen Harper’s radical centrist Conservative party, trading and baiting with China, environmentalists up in arms… It’s only been a few months since the switch over from the old site, but jnarvey.COM has covered a lot of ground this season.

Enjoy the end of year celebration. With 2010 Vancouver Olympics preparations ongoing, a federal election in the offing, and nations picking fights in far too many parts of the world, 2007 promises to be a busy year. Thanks for reading.

Tags: Jonathon Narvey, Vancouver blogger, radical centrist

It’s not impossible for someone to buy a gun legally in Canada – just inconvenient.

Fortunately, the inconvenience of a having to undergo a thorough background check and 28-day waiting period and take a firearms safety course has deterred most Canadians from even bothering to try.

Gun laws in this country once again came under scrutiny (well, discussion, anyway) when Vancouver school board trustee Sharon Gregson ended up on the cover of the National Firearms Journal. Some other trustees took offense.

Gregson has a right to her opinion. For self-defense, there may be no better thing to have in your hand than a loaded gun, assuming you know how to use it and have no compunction about using lethal force on the threat.

The only problem is that for the 99.999999999 per cent of the time when crack-heads aren’t trying to break down your door, that firearm can pose a threat of accidental harm on yourself or your loved ones.

But the main thing is that I wouldn’t trust most of my family members with a loaded gun, much less the majority of Canadians.

Canada’s gun laws are terribly inconvenient. They also save lives.

Tags: gun laws, Sharon Gregson, Travis Brickle