Canadian Cruise Industry Legislation
Can They Do What Americans Can't?
July 6, 2008
There was a day, when you couldn't drag me to a baker's dozen, Buy One Canadian, Get 12 Canadians Free Sale. Now, after spending 21 years with one of the most typical Canadians on the face of the earth and more days than I can count, sipping horrid instant coffee and eating delightful homemade cookies and butter tarts at a Canadian kitchen table, centered in a small kitchen heated with a wood cook stove, I can actually say that given a choice between eating in a kitchen in Canada or the US of A, I would still choose America, but I would seat Canadians at the table. Coming from a woman who will not dine with just anyone, that is quite a compliment.
You can say what you want about Canadians, almost daily I do, but when it comes to getting things done, Americans could learn more than a few things from a Canadian, any day of the week.
First, if you are looking for enemies to battle, you would want to avoid the Canadians. They are some of the meanest, sneakiest, most back-stabbing people on the face of the earth.
When it comes to putting a beating on someone, Canadians have mastered the art. They can be brutal and while their adversary is still thinking about how to plan the attack, the Canadian has drawn first blood and is already rubbing salt into the wound. They don't think too long before going to blows. Add a few beers, and there is no thinking at all, just instant fury followed by renewed respect, back-slapping and more beers.
Now, mind you, I am not talking about "New Canadians" as the northerners call them. I am talking about "Real Canadians", those born and bread in the great white north with genealogy that dates back before the white neck Canadians rolled up their sleeves and decided to kick some good ol' red neck American butt almost two centuries ago.
I have lived among the Real Canadians, and left that country with the thought that wild horses couldn't drag me back to that God forsaken place. But, coming home to America, and seeing it with a much brighter light shining on it, I can say that attitude was clearly a mistake.
Though really, you could not blame me for being ignorant. Coming from Southern California and landing a half day later 500 miles north of the eastern Canadian border, could not even be called culture shock. It was more like landing on Pluto. Back then, the only alliance I had was with the Gretzky's, a Real Canadian who married a Real Southern California girl (like myself) and the only couple on the face of the earth, I had anything in common with.
There was no way my college education in International Business import/export, Pacific Rim, with studies in French and Spanish could begin to prepare me for Northern Canada. I was suppose to be in Europe working at the United Nations, not seat-belted upon a slow moving iceberg with the love of my life, so far from the real world nobody within a hundred miles had ever heard of a tortilla, nor knew anyone who had. I had to make them myself, and invite the locals to try them. I left that country defeated, vowing to never return.
Funny thing happened though, sometime later. It seems once you have lived among Real New Yorkers, Real Canadians begin to look pretty good. But, once you have lived among Real Southerners, Real Canadians look more appealing than a generous portion of Tiramisu accompanied by a double, low foam, no fat, mocha latte with a hint of nutmeg. It is all about perspective.
While I went on about my business, one very important thing happened in the past decade. As life in the U.S. had begun to degrade, and accomplishments were reversed, slowly chipping away at the quality of American life, Canadians had continued to evolve to the point, their quality of life had surpassed that of the average American, by a long shot. That was not the case twenty years ago.
Twenty years ago, if you asked any Canadian you met, and most likely you wouldn't have to ask, they would immediately tell you as soon as they realized they had an American within ear-shot, the average Canadian had a much better quality of life, than the average American did. I could not agree with them twenty years ago.
Clearly, they only had to work five days a week, could holiday two weeks every year and actually afford to travel abroad instead of sitting parked in front of their boob tube for two straight weeks. They also had all the big toys any average citizen could hope for, along with a home they owned, and a spouse they might have argued with weekly, but would never consider divorcing.
For me, back then, the measure of life quality was based on things like sunny days, bug-free air, gourmet foods, stores filled with a wide range assortment of unique goods and the amount of easy-going, calm, at peace, inspired artistic types, who might have been considered "groovy" a few decades prior.
Today, my measuring stick is much different. It now measures things like personal freedom, technological advancements, responsible compassionate government, democracy for those who breath air, not just those meeting a certain criteria such as income, race, religion, age or any other collection of demographic factors. While the U.S. is full of idology, it is short on application.
For me now, quality of life is summarized by politics that are not solely about making a handful of chosen corporate heads filthy rich, but in understanding that the rich only get richer, when the poor get richer, so they can afford to buy what the rich are peddling.
With the high cost of fuel now, American corporations are begriming to crumble, as the arrogant company heads begin to see that the poor can not afford their products and services, because the oil companies have drained the private sector's wallets.
Had the consumption of fuel not increased as American troops sucked up more fuel than most small nations, driving up International fuel demand and prices, Americans would have more money to spend on things like Starbucks coffee, American made cars, home mortgages, credit card payments and holiday travel.
The U.S entered into trade deals that made making products more economical by moving factories to far away, low wage places like India and China. This as a consequence also increased fuel consumption for the transportation of finished goods to the U.S. market. Previously, factories transported goods an average of 1,500 miles to their market. Now, that distance is four times that with a minimum of 6,000 miles from the factory in India or China to the U.S. market. It means fuel consumption attributed to the wholesale transportation of goods to the U.S. market has skyrocketed in the past decade, driving up competition for a limited amount of fuel each year. It has also driven up the price of goods due to higher transportation costs, beyond what average Americans can afford to pay for the necessities of life, nearly all of which are imported.
All of these factors, coupled with so many others, I could list for days on end, now make up the widening difference between Americans and Canadians. Canadians can and do take action quickly, when things begin to run a muck while Americans piss and moan as they do nothing.
In the U.S., half the nation is more fixated on trivial issues like nipplegate and political homosexual tristes between two consenting adults, than ensuring American children, living among a landscape strewn with vacant, crumbling buildings where goods were once produced, can see a doctor when they are ill, have jackets to wear in the winter and food on their plate seven days a week after politicians exported hundreds of thousands of jobs to countries now bidding up the price of oil to meet production demands so they can produce goods for a dwindling number of Americans who can afford to buy them.
It comes as no surprise to me today, that the Canadians are now beginning to look at regulation of the cruise industry in order to protect their environment and their citizens. They will do it, if for no other reason than the fact than the Americans could not. Being better at running their country than Americans are at running theirs, is the single most important factor in Canadian life, to any Real Canadian.
While Californian politicians sold out, in Alaska they passed legislation, they can not enforce, now resulting in a private sector lawsuit against an industry refusing to comply with open access aboard cruise ships for the Alaskan ocean rangers.
The major difference between Canada and the U.S is that one of the nations has a strong majority of politiicans that actually care about those people who pay their salaries, and the other doesn't. This is why Canadians are much more likely to have legislation with teeth governing the cruise industry, long before American politicians will have decided to take guaranteed inaction, bought and paid for by a cruise industry that just doesn't "get it"
Really, the industry doesn't need to "get it". Last week India passed legislation that gave the cruise industry tax-free status. With 1.13 billion people in India, it won't be long before more Indians can afford cruises than Americans can, due to the influx of jobs that were previously on American soil. It is the answer to an industry plagued by North Americans who demand higher standards for the products and services they buy with their dwindling purchasing power.
What the industry heads need to consider though, is though they may be registered in foreign lands, that won't keep them from long prison terms or from being executed when a ship full of passengers sinks to the bottom of the sea or goes up in a blaze of no-glory.
In the U.S. we will talk them to near death in Senate hearings for their slack standards, with our typical all-talk and no-action style of politics. But, in China and India, death for corporate crimes against humanity is a real consequence of corporate mismanagement and negligence.
For now, I am betting on the Canadians to do what the Americans can't, legislate for the good of the people, as a whole, not just for big business or the benefit of a single political party.
