Oil and gas fuel our way of life

Dear Editor:

Increasingly, people are dissatisfied with self-serving governments.

This is creating a backlash throughout the democratic world as citizens erupt into many extremes trying to find remedies.

Thus we see violent extremist leftist politics countered by the extreme right policies of the U.S and the increasing violence this entails.

One example: Trump’s America first is countered by various socialistic elements looking for similar solutions.

Unless conservatism changes to meet the new challenges facing the world today, socialism will continue to rise and we shall enter a period wherein the living standards we have managed to achieve in democracies throughout the world over the last century will disappear.

This unrest is a phenomenon happening throughout the democratic world and will only increase unless governments rise to meet these challenges.

Governments continuing to spend irresponsibly, driven by a fear that reduced spending will result in a loss of votes and political power is causing a downward spiral that will be increasingly hard to rectify.

According to a recent talk by former Prime Minister Stephen Harper in Kelowna, unless we deal with this situation we shall see increasing turmoil as various socialistic groups’ fight to gain the upper hand.

Brexit for example is a backlash because the people in the U.K. wanted to join the European Union for economic reasons. Instead the E.U. became a powerful force taking over the social and political aspects of U.K. lives and sovereignty was lost.

Unrest throughout the world can take many forms, such as the vision by certain elements in the U.S. to see Canada as a national park on their northern border. While the people of Canada see this differently, we are a small country next to a very powerful and rich neighbour.

During this unrest, the U.S. morphed from an importer to a major oil exporter and Canada has been in the grips of special interests causing financial turmoil that is affecting the lives and well-being of every person in Canada.

These extremist groups have a stranglehold on the Canadian economy. They have gained this foothold in Canada because our governments have failed to ensure that people understand that the life we live in Canada is dependent on our resourcebased economy.

Canada is oil and gas. Without that we cannot sustain the lifestyle we live today. Elvena Slump, Penticton