Christmas is a season of joy, peace, and happiness - of goodwill to all.
It is the season where smiles are a little quicker, laughter a little louder, and people generally are a little nicer, mall parking aside. It is season of charity and looking out for those less fortunate. A season when we open our hearts and give of ourselves.
It is also the season where we give to those in our lives we care about. It doesn't have to be a present. It could just be a gift of our time or an act of kindness.
Christmas tends to bring out the best in us.
With that in mind, I would like to offer up a few suggested presents for politicians and others across the land.
Given this has been the year of The Donald, I would respectfully offer Trump a present of humility with a dash of wisdom.
Yes, Mr. Trump, you won. No question about it. The U.S. Electoral College is set up in such a way a few key states carry the day. You don't need to win the popular vote. You just need to win enough delegates. And you did.
However, telling everyone you won by a landslide - in both the Electoral College and the popular vote - is simply untrue. More to the point, to keep repeating the point makes you look like a sore-winner. "Yeah, I won hugely." is just something you should avoid saying.
Even if you seem to think the only reason Ms. Clinton had a larger share of the popular vote than you was due to voter fraud, you still didn't win by a landslide. Barack Obama won his first election by over nine million votes. That is a landslide.
Perhaps more to the point, how many votes did you receive fraudulently? Let's face it, it is not only Democrats who have been accused of vote tampering. With Republican state legislatures working to gerrymander districts and bring in voter suppression laws, it stretches the imagination to believe all of your votes were clean.
To continue to press the issue on your "thank you" tour would suggest you do not understand the concept of being gracious in victory which is a shame because you appeared to be a much more humble president-elect on election night. That is The Donald which needs to occupy the White House in a little over a month.
We will all be better for it.
Closer to home, what sort of present does our prime minister need? After all, he is young, good looking, happily married, with a family name that rings true in Canadian politics. He has a majority government which is centering the politics of the country. He is even looking at the legalization of marijuana.
But perhaps a more adroit handling of the energy file would be a good present. Endorsing a pipeline leading to Vancouver's harbour is going to come back and bite the Liberal Party even if it is the right thing to do.
Too many people live in Vancouver and do not realize just where the wealth of this province and the country lies. Vancouver is a port city with the infrastructure and a worldwide presence which comes with being a major, if not the major, port on the west coast of North America. It is the most sensible site for a major oil terminal but that is certainly not the way people living in Vancouver see it. They will try to make the government pay.
Perhaps the same present could be given to Premier Christy Clark. After years of telling us liquified natural gas is going to be our economic savior, nothing has materialized. We are told in television commercials over $20 billion has already been invested but to what end?
It doesn't seem to have impacted our economy in a significant way.
Certainly the pipelines have yet to be built, let alone the terminals. It is going to be several more years before we start to see any benefits. With an election in the offing, the people of British Columbia will have a chance to voice their view on the whole plan.
Speaking of the coming elections, I would suggest the B.C. Liberals are going to be blessed with a great Christmas present - another term in office. Unless there is major confusion in the Lower Mainland between the B.C. Liberal brand and the federal Liberal Party - which could lead to a rejection of the B.C. Liberals based on the oil terminal in Vancouver - the B.C. Liberals haven't done anything badly enough to be kicked out of office.
In this province, we don't vote governments in - we vote governments out. Given that, it is quite likely the B.C. Liberals will be celebrating a win in May.
Merry Christmas one and all!
