We’re Protecting Syrian Refugees–How About Protecting Canadian Children?

Throughout history, it has been the inaction of those who could have acted; the indifference of those who should have known better; the silence of the voice of justice when it mattered most; that has made it possible for evil to triumph. - Haile Selassie

There is a higher court than courts of justice and that is the court of conscience. It supersedes all other courts. - Mahatma Gandhi

A story has come to my attention in recent days that I need your help in understanding.

I’m not a stupid guy, having IPOd a company while being blessed to count all but one of the Fortune 25 as clients of mine as well as innumerable government agencies, not-for-profits, etc., in multiple countries.

But I am asking for your help to help me understand a story that my mind simply can’t figure out.

Over the course of the past 6 months, the Canadian government has bent over backward to bring 25,000 Syrian refugees to Canada.  This is a noble and essential effort and one that Canada has excelled at for years – bringing hope and love to those who lost sight of both in a life of despair, violence and complexity.

Even with the threat that some of these refugees may be terrorists imbedded within a stream of humanity desperately looking for hope, we accept the refugees anyway. We do so because we believe that it is better to accept such a risk – that we will deal with any miscreants should they surface while simultaneously helping the majority of the people who are floundering.

The reality is that if we always insisted that helping someone must always produce a positive result with absolutely no risk, then we would never help anyone at all.

What kind of world would we have then?

How would you feel if you needed help but were rejected because there was a risk involved in helping you?

Exactly.

So help me to understand something.

Some years ago, a Canadian citizen by the name of Alison Azer (her married name) fell in love with and married a man by the name of Saren Nazer.  He was an immigrant himself, coming from Iran.

His story is complex and is best told in a National Post article that I will reveal in a moment.

The long and short of the story is that this man, a man who raised so many flags with CSIS that his permanent resident status was constantly held up, married a Canadian citizen and had four kids with her.

This is also a man who was charged by the RCMP for uttering threats against his wife, causing her to seek shelter with her children in a woman’s shelter in Victoria.

He also became more and more radicalized regarding Kurdish independence and was tied by CSIS to potential Kurdish terrorist groups.

In other words, this person sounds like trouble.

It is the 21st century, a time when we allegedly defend battered women and children and protect the safety of Canadians against such people.

And despite all of this, in the custody battle that ensued as their marriage fell apart, this man was granted the right to take the four children out of the country for “a vacation”.

He never came back.

That was over 7 months ago.

Their heart breaking story can be found in the following links:

• ‘There are four Canadian kids being held captive in a war zone and no one seems to be doing anything about it’ (National Post)
• Editorial: The government can save these children (Ottawa Citizen)
• Canadian mom Alison Azer fears abducted kids in Iraq with their dad (CBC – The Current)
• Find Azer Kids Now (public awareness website)

Here is where I need your help.

We are told that our government will go to the ends of the earth to protect us and to help us in times of need.

We have watched our government go to the ends of the earth to bring 25,000 Syrians here to experience real living in a nation built upon peace, love and opportunity.

Meanwhile ….

Four Canadian children somewhere in the world are crying to their mom for help.

A Canadian woman weeps for her children who have been taken illegally from her, with the courts subsequently having given her sole custody of them.

The government knows where the children are.

And yet our government does nothing to help them or her. Maybe it's because many of our elected officials seem to prefer to tackle the easy stuff that generates great PR / feel-good for their own needs rather than take on the important things for their constituents that is also more difficult to solve.

The media does little to carry the message into the light of day, preferring to pontificate ad nauseum about matters more sensationalist but no more important than the safety of Canadian children.

Mayors of major Canadian cities have no comment but tell them that a puppy is lost in their city and they are all over it.

And so my question is ….. why?

Why do we allow this to happen?

If we are a so-called great nation extending a hand of love and understanding to those who are lost in the world, why can’t we do the same to one of our own who merely wants her children back?

Wouldn’t you want your children back if this happened to you?

Exactly.

So why aren’t we doing more to help this woman and her children?

Can you answer that one question for me …..

…. please?

In service and servanthood,

Harry

More Anti-Terrorism Laws

A guest post by Gwynne Dyer on May 11, 2015.  Shared here with explicit written permission of the author.

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Left-wing, right-wing, it makes no difference. Almost every elected government, confronted with even the slightest “terrorist threat”, responds by attacking the civil liberties of its own citizens. And the citizens often cheer them on.

Last week, the French government passed a new bill through the National Assembly that vastly expanded the powers of the country’s intelligence services. French intelligence agents will now be free to plant cameras and recording devices in private homes and cars, intercept phone conversations without judicial oversight, even  install “keylogger” devices that record every key stroke on a targeted computer in real time.

It was allegedly a response to the “Charlie Hebdo” attacks that killed 17 people in Paris last January, but the security services were just waiting for an excuse. Indeed, Prime Minister Manuel Valls said that the law was needed to give a legal framework to intelligence agents who are already pursuing some of these practices illegally. France, he explained, has never “had to face this kind of terrorism in our history.”

Meanwhile, over in Canada, Defence Minister Jason Kenney was justifying a similar over-reaction in by saying that “the threat of terrorism has never been greater.” Really?

In all the time since 9/11 there had never been a terrorist attack in Canada until last October, when two Canadian soldiers were killed in separate incidents. Both were low-tech, “lone wolf” attacks by Canadian converts to Islam – in one, the murder weapon was simply a car – but the public (or at least the media) got so excited that the government felt the need to “do something.”

The Anti-Terror Act, which has just passed the Canadian House of Commons, gives the Canadian Security Intelligence Service the right to make “preventive” arrests in Canada. It lets police arrest and detain individuals without charge for up to seven days. The bill’s prohibitions on speech that “promotes or glorifies terrorism” are so broad and vague that any extreme political opinion can be criminalised.

In short, it’s the usual smorgasbord of crowd-pleasing measures that politicians throw out when they want to look tough. It won’t do much to stop terrorist attacks, but that doesn’t matter as the threat is pretty small anyway.

France has 65,000,000 million people, and it lost 17 of them to terrorism in the past year. Canada has 36,000,000 million people, and it has lost precisely 2 of them to domestic terrorism in the past twenty years. In what way were those lives more valuable than those of the hundreds of people who die each year in France and Canada from less newsworthy crimes of violence like murder?

Why haven’t they changed the law to stop more of those crimes? If you monitored everybody’s electronic communications all the time, and bugged their homes and cars, you could probably cut the murder rate in half. The price, of course, would be that you have to live in an Orwellian surveillance state, and we’re not willing to pay that price. Not just to cut the murder rate.

The cruel truth is that we put a higher value on the lives of those killed in terrorist attacks because they get more publicity. That’s why, in an opinion poll last month, nearly two-thirds of French people were in favor of restricting freedoms in the name of fighting extremism – and the French parliament passed the new security law by 438 votes to 86.

The government in France is Socialist, but the opposition centre-right supported the new law too. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government in Canada is seriously right-wing, but the centre-right Liberals were equally unwilling to risk unpopularity by opposing it. On the other hand, the centre-left New Democrats and the Greens voted against, and the vote was closer in Canada: 183 to 96.

And the Canadian public, at the start 82 percent in favour of the new law, had a rethink during the course of the debate. By the time the Anti-Terror Act was passed in the House of Commons, 56 percent of Canadians were against it. Among Canadians between 18 and 34 years old, fully three-quarters opposed it.

Maybe the difference just reflects the smaller scale of the attacks in Canada, but full credit to Canadians for getting past the knee-jerk phase of their response to terrorism. Nevertheless, their parliament still passed the bill. So should we chalk all this up as two more victories for the terrorists, with an honourable mention for the Canadian public?

No, not really. Islamic State, al-Qaeda, and all the other jihadis don’t give a damn if Western democracies mutilate their own freedoms, as it doesn’t significantly restrict their own operations. The only real winners are the security forces.

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Gwynne Dyer is an independent journalist whose articles are published in 45 countries.

Canadian Healthcare–Villains Amongst the Heroes

Who is to say who is the villain and who is the hero? Probably the dictionary. - Joss Whedon

Of the many gifts that my parents gave to me when I was young, two stand out.

From my mother, I received the gift of reading and the insatiable need for constant knowledge acquisition.

From my father, I received the gift of constantly asking questions, the need to understand the “why” of things and the need to never stop asking until I was satisfied with the answer.

Both gifts came together suddenly on Saturday past when my father was admitted to hospital in Eastern Canada in septic shock and renal failure.

It turns out that he was suffering from a retroperitoneal abscess, a massive, internal pus-filled infection that has a 75% mortality rate.

Thanks to the healthcare practitioners who quickly and correctly diagnosed this condition, my father is now recuperating, fortunate to be in the 25% and not the 75%.

I am very grateful to them for their quick thinking and the result.

But as my father taught me, after an event occurs it is important to understand why this happened so that it doesn’t happen again to my father or to anyone else.

Blame is not important but prevention is.

So a little due diligence produced this interesting trail of events.

Retroperitoneal abscesses are caused by a number of things including infections introduced via hospital procedures such as routine diagnostics or surgeries.  They are also caused by bleeding within the body, including bleeding from ulcers or micro ulcers.

A little extra digging revealed the fact that my father was on an anti-inflammatory medication for 17 years as a preventative measure against a bout of arthritis he had suffered years ago.

That’s like taking aspirin for 17 years on the off-chance that you might get a headache at some point.

I spoke to a couple of doctors about the use of this medication for this long as a preventative measure and they told me that it is simply not allowed.  One doctor, when I described the use of this medication for this long, replied with one phrase, that being (and forgive the language) “Holy Shit”.

One of the interesting by-products of this medication even in short-term use is the potential for the creation of micro ulcers and bleeding and the risk is especially heightened in the elderly.  For this reason, monitoring for bleeding is required although in my father’s case, no such monitoring was performed.

Hmmmmmm …. the plot thickens.

The documentation accompanying the medication indicates that it must be used in the minimum dosage possible and for as short a duration as possible.  I wonder what the risks are from taking it for 17 years.

Exploring the doctor’s background, one quickly learns that he:

- sought to put a 20 year old male on valium to slow him down because “he works too hard”

- once put a 22 year old male on Dolobid, Feldene and Orudis (all anti-inflammatory medications used for the treatment of osteoarthritis and / or rheumatoid arthritis) and aspirin simultaneously upon receiving complaint of a sore back and without any further testing to justify the use of the medications

- sent the same young male to the hospital a short time later with the diagnosis that he was having a heart attack (he turned out to be fine although the medical team that had been alerted weren’t too pleased with the doctor).  There are known complications from the previously named medications and heart and stroke risk although the connection was never made or explored.

- told a mid 40’s patient after placing him on cholesterol treatment medication that it would be easier to treat the patient if he weren’t an alcoholic.  The patient, a non-drinker, discovered that the initial baseline liver test that is required for this medication had not been performed and the subsequent liver test for monitoring abnormal medicinal impact indicated that the liver was seriously malfunctioning (a known side effect of the medication).  Without a baseline, the doctor was blaming it incorrectly on the lifestyle of the patient and the liver function returned to normal when use of the medication stopped.

- told a female patient that the pneumonia scars on her lungs as seen in a chest x-ray were in fact the signs of lung cancer and that treatment for such was imperative.

People are still emailing me their stories.  I think these are sufficient and are verifiable with doctor-written reports, hospital reports and prescriptions.

So, as a strategy guy who asks a lot of questions (thanks, Dad – it’s all your fault), I look at past performance as a predictor of current / future behavior.

And what I see appears to be much more than coincidence.

All that being said, we must not forget  ……………..

The Canadian healthcare system is filled with many heroes, people who go above and beyond to treat an incredibly diverse collection of diseases and injuries with ever-tightening constraints in the resources that they have access to.

Such are the heroes who saved my father’s Life this weekend and I am grateful to them.

In fact, I believe all Canadians should feel grateful to have such a healthcare system, one of the best in the world.

However, it is doesn’t help the heroes when there are doctors who are actually introducing patients into the system through carelessness or negligence that probably shouldn’t have been introduced in the first place.

Maybe a prescription of litigation such as is used in the US might cure the system of what ails it.  I’m don’t know as I’m not sure if the pandemic of litigation sweeping the US is actually solving anything or just making everything more complicated.

Meanwhile, the Canadian system won’t get better if we refuse to question the actions of a few bad apples merely because we don’t want to offend the heroes in the system, because we are told that we shouldn’t question anyone with more knowledge or authority or because we are told that we should feel so grateful for the entire system that to question anything is to be expressing a lack of gratitude for everything.

And it won’t get better in cases like my father’s when doctors will privately admit that this doctor made mistakes but will not admit so publicly for fear of losing their own jobs.

The bottom line …..

The best way we can help the healthcare system and ourselves is to follow the advice of my parents when they imparted these two key elements upon me many years ago:

1. Learn all that you can – in this case, about your health and any treatment options that a doctor insists you follow

2. Don’t be afraid to ask questions until you’re satisfied, even if it means offending someone.  A good doctor will welcome questions and dialog.  Open dialog brings knowledge and understanding, both of which strengthen the relationship and the results.  Only the weak-minded or those with something to hide will get angry or defensive when the opportunity for dialog arises.  Either are a warning that perhaps a second opinion should be sought.

I was raised to always be respectful of doctors and I am, recognizing the incredible knowledge that many have, the constraints that they work within and their raison d'être, their desire to heal others.

But I think one can have the deepest respect for someone and still not be afraid to ask questions of them.

What do you think?

My questioning continues …..

How about yours?

In service and servanthood,

Harry

Canada's Role in the World - A Disruptive Conversation

Have you ever had a conversation with a person or a group of people that was so powerfully disruptive in a positive way that it caused you to stop and reassess everything you ever thought about regarding personal purpose, national pride or an opportunity to make an impact in the world.  Have you ever had such a conversation where all of these things came into play in a single dialog?

I have just had one of those experiences at an event hosted by Canada's World and to be honest, my brain is still struggling to come to grips with the magnitude and potential of the conversation.

I was honored and privileged this weekend past to participate in a national dialog around reassessing Canada's role in the world and it was powerful.

Before I go any further, I know what you may be thinking.

Yes, Harry, we've all seen these things before.  So much dialog with no results in the end.  Expectations set and then dashed.  Some events even grew so heated that people in the event imploded as they were unable to come to grips with their passion and differences in defining our role in the world.

However, this one was different.

Oh sure, we had all the same types of participants, including but not limited to:

• Anglophones
• Francophones
• Aboriginal peoples
• young people
• life-experienced people
• well traveled, and not-so-well traveled folks
• varied education levels
• retired folks and people just engaging in careers
• diverse career selection - public and private sector, entrepreneurs, educators, writers, ecology-focused, etc.

So what was special about this dialog?

A couple of things come to mind.

First and foremost, the group that came together was unified in their love of Canada first and what it means to be a Canadian (even though their definition of being a Canadian varied).

Secondly, we came together with a vision for Canada's role in the world and the strong belief that Canada needs to reassert itself as a leader in a number of areas - political, diplomatic, socioeconomic, ecological and with new innovate economic models to name a few.  We are proud of what Canada has accomplished but see the need to raise the level of contribution and results significantly on all fronts at home and abroad.

All that being said, the thing that grabbed me the most was the heightened level of passion, respect and collaboration that embraced this group.

Conversations about identifying our role as leaders domestically and globally often break down as different groups debate who is more or less significant, who has contributed to or detracted from solutions, etc.  We certainly had enough contrasting demographics to have gone down that slippery slope if we wanted to.

But we never went down that path.

Instead, we embraced our respective differences as the thing that makes Canada great - that in Canada, all voices matter and that it is the differences in language, culture and life experiences that each one of us brings to the table that enables us to create innovative solutions that other countries will choose to model.

Our different backgrounds and experiences made the conversation stronger, more relevant and more profound.

One of the important elements for me is that such a conversation goes nowhere unless it produces a call to action.  Dialog without results is just entertainment and frustrating at that.

Canada was once looked upon as a leader in many areas of international and domestic policy.  While some leaders would have us believe that all is still wonderful from the perspective of how others view us, a number of domestic and international studies tell a completely different story.

How do we reassert ourselves as a global leader, perceived by other countries as the role model by which they can learn?

We start at home - we lead by example.  We continue to embrace our phenomenal culture originally built upon three founding nations - Anglophone, Francophone and Aboriginal peoples.  Our relationships aren't perfect.  However, they are incredibly powerful when combined and growing stronger every day - an incredible model of cultural diversity and collaboration that many envy.

We embrace immigrants who come to our country.  We tend to forget that outside of Aboriginal peoples, we are all immigrants here in one form or another.  Let's make this a place where an immigrant's education and accreditation abroad mean something here.  We need to encourage intellectual and cultural capital to flow into this country.  While some people say that Canada is an easy place to immigrate, there are many stories that suggest there is room for improvement in how we attract and retain people from all over the world.

Let's stop talking about things like Kyoto and actually start living up to our green commitments and obligations.  If we make a lot of noise about creating initiatives that we don't live up to, other countries eventually stop listening to us.

Let's stop talking about being "greener" and be truly green.  We see green technology as an investment and not an expenditure.  Our brilliant researchers in green technology can create technology that we embrace in Canada and cause other countries to say "I want what they have".  We can and must market this technology to the world.

We need to stop bragging about our wonderful healthcare and education systems as being the best in the world (which they are not) and focus on actually fixing the challenges within them, to create a truly enviable system that countries around the world will copy.

We talk about our wonderful cradle to grave system, yet so many of our children live below the poverty line, with insufficient food, clothing, shelter and personal safety.

There are so many topics - these are just a few.

However, the conversation this weekend made one thing very clear to me.

We need to care.  We need to stop being indifferent or apathetic to what is going on inside and outside of Canada.

We need to restoke the passion within us as Canadians.   Many of us spend a lot of time waiting for someone else to fix our concerns domestically and internationally while at the same time, simmering on the inside that others are not doing it fast enough or to our liking.

Pogo noted "we have met the enemy and he is us".

We are our greatest enemy and yet we are our greatest strength.

We can choose to be indifferent, apathetic people waiting for someone else to fix things while we complain the solutions aren't right, aren't fast enough, aren't thorough enough, etc.

Or .....

We can choose to be a part of the solution, to engage with fellow Canadians, to bring our strengths, talents and skills to bear to craft the perception of Canada, internally and externally, that WE believe we are.

It starts with an inner passion to get engaged.

Once your passion is stoked, bring your passion and beliefs to the table in a national dialog that makes government, NGOs and citizens equally responsible and accountable for manifesting the country that we know we are capable of creating - one that sets new standards by example and establishes a new paradigm domestically and internationally.

Are you ready to help manifest Canada's destiny in the 21st century or would you rather lament about how others are not living up to your expectation?

I think I know what you would prefer.

When you are ready to contribute, go to Canada's World and prepare to engage in a positive, constructive, respectful dialog with fellow Canadians who are passionate about improving how Canada becomes a role model in a number of different areas on the global stage.

Canada and the world eagerly await your strengths, talents and skills and the passion that you have to make this place a better one for everyone.

Your ideas have potential to profoundly influence and impact the world.

Isn't that an incredible thing to realize?

Yours in service and servanthood.

Harry