By Peter Christensen

Op-Ed Commentary

Political scientists and historians talk about “Alignment Problems,” more accurately ‘Misalignment Problems.’Misalignment of ground level action with upper-level geopolitical goals have bedeviled governments (and individuals) for thousands of years. Since the beginning of time leaders have been trying to align themselves with goals that benefit themselves and those around them. Not everyone has the same goals and therein lies the conflict.

Very recently, one day before scheduled peace talks between Russia and Ukraine, (to be held in Istanbul, Turkey), Ukraine unveiled explosive laden drones smuggled deep into Russian territory and hit strategic military targets.

 American news reported that 40 long range bombers whose sole purpose was to deliver missiles to US targets and transatlantic shipping were destroyed. Ukraine said the bombers were delivering cruise missiles to Ukrainian targets. Peace talks were ongoing during this same period and continued the day after the attacks. They accomplished little; an agreement to exchange bodies of the war-dead. What tragedy?

These international stories find their way into our lives and we wonder what, if anything this will mean in our daily life.

Then there are the National stories. We recently elected a Conservative MP. Most of Western Canada elected Conservative representatives. In Canada’s densely populated urban areas where most of the population resides (and therefore where most seats are based), enough Liberals were elected to form ‘our’ government.

An urban elite wrapped in environmentally ‘theistic” beliefs voted in a cosmopolitan banker in the hope that he would lead the country into alignment.  The banker mouthed predictions of a ‘super energy’ economy  where all the birds and flowers would survive.

Citizens who see on a daily basis how Canada’s wealth is generated voted Conservative. Even the sacrosanct union vote swung toward Conservatism. Strange things followed.

B.C.’s NDP Premier David Eby fast-tracked Bill 15, the Infrastructure Projects Act, to accelerate permits for resource projects. The bill undermined his environmentalist support and challenged Constitutional obligations to First Nations.

A week later in Saskatoon at a federally hosted gathering of provincial leaders, Premier Eby spoke out against Alberta’s proposal for an oil pipeline to the coast to access Asian markets. A week later he announced a move to fast track an LNG pipeline from Northern B.C. to Kitimat on a decade old permit.

Prime Minister Mark Carney talked about Canada becoming an ‘energy superpower,’ about a “decarbonized barrel of oil being within the national interest.” He placated Liberal urbanites with pleasant-speak about ‘creating’ new national parks and raised the pay for an on-side CBC.

Prime Minister Carney and Premier Eby are chameleons. Premier Eby pretends to be a Conservative while Prime Minister Carny pretends to be a Liberal. Clever politicians, they solve their alignment problem by fence-sitting. They wait and bluff and feed all sides. Our economy dives. The dollar drops. Trump plays tariff games. We hope for the best. We hang on for the outcome?

On the home front: yesterday I sold my tack. Forty years of trail dust marched out of the barn into the back of a pick-up. A couple of VHF radios, the saddle rack and my patiently refurbished cedar rib canoe went with it. A family with four boys and two girls all coming of age bought the lot. I was moved that they all showed up for the exchange. The best of it was a Benton Moore handmade saddle from Grosbeck, Texas that I put a lot of comfortable miles on.

I sold this stuff because I was having alignment problems. I was no longer a horseman, yet I hoarded these artifacts. I had not used the saddles for 20 years, my fences have fallen, the corrals rails have rotted. The strong gates I built as a kind of testimony to the whole set up being back-country operational still stand.

But you see I don’t ride any more, the saddles feel heavy, the pack saddles are gone. I would have to work from habit to ‘throw a diamond.’ What was the point in keeping this stuff around? I watched it go down the lane for enough dollars to buy a used ride-on lawn mower.

There are only two times in life when one is unreserved in saying what one thinks: when you are young and naïve and when you are old and don’t give a shit. This is what the day came down to, worrying about the Russians, listening to Carney and Eby try to please everybody and selling the tack? Alignment problems?

– Peter Christensen is a Columbia Valley based writer and poet.

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