Questions without answers
Ian McInnes
The McLeod River Post
One of the things that really gets under my skin as a journalist is when I ask a question, no tricks, just a genuine question the response can be a bewildering tirade of corporatese, a completely different answer, ignoring the question altogether or no comment at all, the last is probably the most honest.
I had the misfortune to catch part of the Canadian House of Commons questions period recently. Is it any wonder why people don’t vote? Loud raucous, playground behaviour, lack of respect for anyone speaking and then the questions many of which are not addressed and palmed off with a statement. Why bother? Shame on you all.
The U.S. has reported a drop in GDP for the latest quarter but President Joe Biden said he’s not concerned about a recession. I winced when I heard that. It’s not the first or likely the last I’ll hear that from politicians, experts or organizations. Only for them to go silent or have to eat their words further down the line.
Hello? My gut is telling me that we have a perfect storm brewing here. Inflation is rampant and getting worse, interest rates rises rarely make things better except that rich people get richer. We are still in a pandemic, an inconvenient truth, the supply chain is all messed up because it was flawed anyway and the chickens have come home to roost and there is a major war in Europe that could expand. Aside from that, things are great. Exper ts and politicians don’t seem to take human behaviour into account. When money is tight people cut back, sometimes they stop discretionary spending altogether and sometimes can’t pay for essentials, shelter, food, fuel and utilities. In the crazy consumer driven economy that we have, that’s bad. Stuff gets made and it’s not bought. How is that going to work out? Look at your history books.
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NASA recently taken by its helicopter on Mars show debris from a spacecraft. No, it’s not aliens. It’s human space garbage from the landing of the Perseverance Rover that landed in 2021. Why does that depress me?
The war in Ukraine continues and already I’ve noticed that some networks are not covering it as much. Will be it shunted out of the way like other wars? I hope not. People, some anyway, could use a good dose of reality. Will it, could it, escalate into WWIII? I believe yes. I hope that I’m wrong.