By Barry Stagg
August 1999
Some times the new age of technology fools us into believing that the old vices of greed, lust, envy and plain old selfishness have left us. Then we look at the latest lazy coast to pension heaven by white-collared do-nothings and we know that the old ways are also the new ways.
Out here in the Newfoundland diaspora we see many briefcase Newfoundlanders passing through from St. John's telling us how Newfoundland culture is alive and well thanks to their bureaucratic assistance.
Look for these earnest purveyors of self-interest anytime a Newfoundland festival of any sort attracts the torpid interest of the tourism commissars so snugly ensconced in the bowels of the provincial civil service.
Over time we get to see numerous variations on the same promotional theme: send money and managers off the Island to tell the converted (expatriates all) that Newfoundland is a fine place. A little patronizing of the province's rural folk culture for the benefit of the local snob class is standard fare as well. It lets the smart Toronto types know that the commissars are their kind of people.
Never have we seen more of this than lately, with Icebergs (???) being driven to Toronto to provide background chatter at the local beer tent. Personally, I would rather see a few dozen harp seals ferried to Toronto in place of the rather banal berg. Letting the friendly harps make a new home in Toronto harbour would be just fine with me.
Getting out of the office may be a fine goal for the good folk running the tourism bureau in the Land of Tobin. They might better serve the long term goals of Newfoundlanders by giving up their expense account pennies to fisheries minister John Efford who doubtlessly could ship a lot of seals to the animal lovers living on the Toronto Islands with that kind of spending money.
Seals are favoured creatures up here in the freshwater seas of Ontario. Hoods and harps have never had the chance to properly introduce themselves to the gracious locals. Despite this oversight, the seal herds should be as favourably received in the Beaches enclave of Toronto as are real human Newfoundlanders. That means they will be tolerated.
Animals are much more readily absorbed into the charitable bosom of Toronto than are ordinary Newfoundlanders. Thus Newfoundlanders of purported "higher degree" take care to let the local snobs know that they visit in the spirit of collegial solidarity. They are all in it together, so to speak. Premier B.T. can apply this class-driven technique the next time he hits Toronto to chat up the local bagmen.
Now, with fifty years punched on the confederation clock, Newfoundlanders can look forward to the same class driven system that delivered Newfoundland to Canada in exchange for federal welfare cheques and good business for government contractors. The royal court is still around in 1999.
Digging a little deeper in the bog that is Newfoundland politics reveals that the only solid mass found is the fifty year old pipeline that oozes money and power from the Ottawa treasury to the maple leaf brigade in St. John's. Loyalty is a pay cheque.
Real wealth has been denied to the regular folk of the province by stripping away the resources that brought Newfoundland into existence five hundred years ago. That means the fishery, folks. It took less than fifty years for the sober sinecures in Ottawa and St. John's to sell a great world resource. What they could not sell they poisoned with welfare cholera.
After 1999 is over, the careless governing of Newfoundland's prizes will go on, applying equal amounts of indifference and unpatriotic allegiance to masters who are anything but Newfoundlanders. Brian Tobin does not have to change his stripes to return to Ottawa.