A Just Society: Oil, Americans and Mythology

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

"In the course of the conflict between the Reagan administration and Ottawa, we Albertans are expected as loyal Canadians to cheer for the victory of Mr. Trudeau and his thug government. Some of us will find this very hard. We will wave the flag, of course. But deep in our hearts we will be hoping that the Americans whip the hell out of him." - Ted Byfield, founding Reform Party member (1)

Carl Olof Nickle (1914 - 1990) was an editor, publisher, oil baron, soldier and federal politician, representing a Calgary riding. He would retire from politics in 1957 and focus instead on the Alberta oil and gas industry.

As early as 1956 he had been discussing that industry and the Middle East. During one lecture he said:

I would like to comment on the outlook for expansion of markets for our Western Canadian crude oil a matter of particular importance to all Calgarians because of the effect it has had, and will have in the future on our growth as "Canada's Oil Capital". The recent and continuing crisis in the Middle East, where about two thirds of the world's presently proved oil reserves are located, has further emphasized the importance to Canada, this continent and to the Free World of the proved reserves plus the far vaster undiscovered reserves of the Western Hemisphere, including those of our Western Canada.

The longer term outlook is a confused one, in which the one fact most apparent is that the Middle East cannot be banked on as a secure supply of oil for Free World needs. The military might of Russia poses a constant threat. Even if there is no attempt by Russia to seize the Middle East by force which would almost certainly involve the Western World in a war for survival of its oilfed economy we face the prospect of interruptions to oil supply caused by the combination of Soviet propaganda and Arab nationalism. (2)

He speaks of the possible involvement of the Western World in a "war for survival of its oilfed economy". He also speaks of the threat of a "combination of Soviet propaganda and Arab nationalism."

This is not unlike the lecture given by American General Thomas Metz when he spoke to a group of senior Canadian military officers, soldiers, defence analysts and lobbyists in Toronto in 2006.

He ... shows a chart depicting the military challenges America faces, measured in terms of level of danger and level of likelihood. At the very apex—the most dangerous and the most likely—sits just one: radical Islamic terrorism. "Radical Islam wants to reestablish the Caliphate," says Metz. "Just as Hitler wrote Mein Kampf, you can read what they want to do." (3)

A Caliphate is a union of the Muslim world. It was the first political philosophy that adopted the notion of using their natural resources to look after their people. It wasn't communism, or socialism, it was just a belief in something bigger than they were. God or Allah, and they believed that this is what he wanted them to do. But nationalizing their natural resources (oil) runs contra to the West's goals of exploitation. Metz continues:

In his southern drawl, the general notes how much oil the U.S. consumes—roughly 25 per cent of the world's consumption, even though Americans make up only 5 per cent of the world's population—and how central this is to the country's high standard of living ... The connection between America's voracious oil consumption and the dangers of radical Islamic terrorism are never explicitly stated by Lt.-Gen. Metz; he simply notes that the Islamic world has a lot of oil and what happens there has an impact on energy markets. But an important element has clearly been added to the picture: the U.S. needs what lies under the ground in the Islamic world if Americans are to go on living the bounteous life that lies at the heart of the American dream—a life that has them devouring the lion's share of the world's energy. (3)

Not unlike 50 years ago when Carl Nickles raised the possibility of "the Western World in a war for survival of its oilfed economy."

So when Russia invaded Afghanistan, Reagan, the product of American corporatism, went into action, working with a group of "Terrorists" to secure the oil for American interests. And this is why Albertans, like Ted Byfield, hoped that Americans would whip the hell out of Pierre Trudeau, because he worked to secure our oil for the benefit of Canadians first. A home grown, non-religious caliphate.

I've written before about the National Energy Program that has taken on mystical proportions, through good PR. Even Westerners not born at the time, will raise it as an argument for their feelings of "alienation".

But the NEP did not destroy Alberta, nor was it an attempt to destroy Alberta. It was a battle between the Government of Canada and (mostly American) corporate interests. And it was not about oil so much as it was about taxes and regulations that hampered the Americans from getting richer at our expense.

The Red Flag Budget

When Joe Clark's government fell after only a few months in power, and Pierre Trudeau returned with a majority, the western provinces were concerned with the direction the government would now be going. Clark had attempted to reduce or reverse some of the programs and policies of the previous six years, including the elimination of Petro-Canada's role in national energy matters and, if possible, the privatization of the company. (4)

But he was gone, and Trudeau instead took an interventionist approach, deemed necessary to protect Canadians. As oil prices were rising, Alberta grew richer, and as this meant that equalization payments to the other provinces would increase, he would need extra revenue to ensure that the cheques didn't bounce.

Eventually Trudeau and Premier Peter Lougheed reached a suitable arrangement, and appeared on the front page of newspapers across the country, sipping champagne.

But this did nothing to appease the oil industry which was mostly American. You can see from the following chart that in 1980 only 26.1% of the Petroleum industry was Canadian owned and 18.7% Canadian controlled. And though Ontario had been forced for many years to pay higher than the market rate for their oil, to prop up the industry, the West now rose up in anger that they might have to start paying back.

And the most vocal among them was Carl Nickle:

The most outspoken of these critics was Carl Nickle, a prominent oilfield executive and former Tory MP, who publicly condemned the entire budget outright as discriminatory and repressive. "I believe short term political gain for central Canada will foster more alienation, possible [sic] even lead to splitting the nation apart." (1)

But what they were the most upset about was the new tax structure in finance minister Alan McEachern's budget, that would eliminate many deductions, the corporate sector had enjoyed.

When Allan MacEachen was appointed finance minister in 1980 big business requested that government examine the tax system with a view to making changes. But MacEachen's senior advisers soon focused his attention on how billions of dollars were being lost yearly to scores of dubious corporate tax breaks.
Finance officials put together a tax reform package designed, among other things, to eliminate 165 of the most costly and counter-productive tax expenditure measures and in the process increase revenue by close to $3 billion. When he introduced the legislation it caused a firestorm of protest from the corporate elite.

Neil Brooks, now professor of tax law at Osgoode Hall Law School, was working for the finance department on the tax reform package and has recalled the tactics of the large corporations. "It's almost a classic example of what's called a capital strike. I mean, business simply said to the government that if you go ahead with these measures we will stop investing in Canada." The development industry reacted instantly. "Literally the next day they were closing jobs down and . . . pulling cranes off construction jobs." (5)

This was because of taxes, not the NEP, but if the corporate world was going to create an AstroTurf, "grassroots" movement they couldn't very well say that they were upset that they would have to start paying their fair share. So instead they sold it as being an attack by Ottawa on the West, and with the help of Ted Byfield, an early Reform Party mentor, they shifted public sentiment from one of Canadian nationalism to Western regionalism, and it almost broke up the country, as several separatist movements exploded on the scene.

"In the months and years that followed, Byfield's Alberta Report continued to mythologize the intent and the impact of the NEP" (1) and it would culminate in the creation of a new party, with the help of Stephen Harper: the Reform Party of Canada, now calling itself the Conservative Party of Canada, headed up by the same Stephen Harper. It was Byfield who gave the party their original battle cry: "The West wants in".

And that same Stephen Harper is helping "the Western World in a war for survival of its oilfed economy" (not fighting radical Islam) by committing our soldiers to three more years of war. And he is continuing his program of tax reduction for our wealthiest citizens, meaning that the rest of us will have to absorb the costs of those three more years of war.

Forget 'Western alienation'. This is the alienation of Canadian citizens and we want in dammit.

Sources:

1. Of Passionate Intensity: Right-Wing Populism and the Reform Party of Canada, By Trevor Harrison, University of Toronto Press, 1995. ISBN: 0-8020-7204-6, Pg. 60-65

2. Nickle Forecasts Expanded Role For Canadian Oil Stimulated By Middle East Crisis, Oil Patch History, November 17, 1956

3. Holding the Bully's Coat, Canada and the U.S. Empire, By Linda McQuaig, Doubleday Canada, 2007, ISBN 978-0-385-66012-9, pg. 67-69

4. Towards a Just Society: The Trudeau Years, Edited by Thomas S. Axworthy and Pierre Elliot Trudeau, Viking Press, 1990, ISBN: 0-670-83015-1, Pg. 60

5. The Myth of the Good Corporate Citizen: Canada and Democracy in the Age of Globalization, By Murray Dobbin, James Lorimer & Company, 2003, ISBN: 1-55028-785-0, Pg. 168

Redefining Populism and a Battle for Religion

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

In 1963, The Anglican Congress sought out Pierre Berton, to write a book on Christianity in Canada.

Inspired by Vatican II, a modernizing of the Catholic faith, they wanted to also change focus, and become a "listening" church, "hearing" things the world around them was saying. (1)

They chose Berton because he was an agnostic. They didn't want another religious text, but an articulate and honest account of the Church at the time.

And Berton delivered. The resulting book; The Comfortable Pew became a best-seller and a topic of conversation for some time.

But not everyone was impressed.

Ted Byfield and the Opposition of Fundamentalists

Ted Byfield was a controversial journalist, publisher and author, perhaps best known for his cult-like disciplinary school, the Company of the Cross. He was responsible for the gruelling canoe trip that resulted in the deaths of twelve boys and one instructor in 1978.

When Berton's book hit the shelves, Byfield, then an Anglican, was outraged. In response, he wrote his own book: Just Think Mr. Berton (A Little Harder).

A die-hard fundamentalist, Byfield was opposed to any modernization of the Anglican Church. Sin was sin. You can't modernize that.

“If adultery or homosexuality is wrong in the sight of God, then all the task forces in Christendom aren’t going to make it right. If God is timeless and changeless, then human conduct considered wrong in the eighth century is just as wrong in the twentieth” (2)

And if Berton's book was a call for the Church to become socially relevant, Byfield's was the exact opposite, and he became a man on a mission.

The book defended traditional religious morality and practice and denounced the increasing attempts of Christian churches to become socially 'relevant.' This foray into journalism reawakened Byfield's appetite for the news business, and in 1973 he convinced the other members of the Genesee board to begin publishing a weekly newsmagazine, St. John's Edmonton Report. Edmonton Report was followed into production four years later by St. John's Calgary Report. In 1979 both magazines were merged into Alberta Report. By 1986 an identical but renamed version of Alberta Report ...

Articulate and controversial, the Alberta Report has been, since its inception, western Canada's most prominent and consistent organ for the dissemination of conservative values. In articles and, more especially, editorials and columns (written by Ted and, in recent years, his son Link and other guest writers), the magazine has stood firmly for corporal and capital punishment, the teaching of fundamentalist Christian religion in schools, the rights of the family (that is, the parents), and free enterprise, while espousing an often virulent hatred of metrification, pro-choice advocates, feminism in general, public school curriculums and methods of discipline, divorce, human rights commissions, 'mainstream' Christianity, homosexuality, penal reform, sex education, unions, public ownership, teachers' associations, and rock music. (3)

And the Alberta Report would help to launch the Reform movement.

The Merging of Ideas

After two years of Brian Mulroney, the West was once again ready to rise up. Ted Byfield was part of a group discussing a new party, where the only thing the government would legislate was morality. Another group of wealthy oilmen wanted to remove any impediments to their industry, and Preston Manning really wanted to be prime minister. He felt that the time may finally be right to launch the party that he and his father had envisioned in their Political Realignment.

A socially conservative party.

The oilmen provided the capital, Manning the political platform and Byfield the propaganda, by writing a series of articles calling for the need of a new party to represent the west. In fact it was Byfield who came up with the party slogan: "The West Wants in".

He also provided free advertising for any party events, making sure he attracted the "right" people. Those who read his magazine and shared his views. They provided the much needed "populist" base, for an AstroTurf party representing corporate interests.

Sources:

1. The Comfortable Pew Revisited, By Michael Creal, Catholic New Times, January 16, 2005

2. The Wisdom of Ted Byfield, The Van Maren Traditionalist Views, December 22, 2009

3. Of Passionate Intensity: Right-Wing Populism and the Reform Party of Canada. By Trevor Harrison Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1995. ISBN: 0-8020-7204-6, pg. 50-51

Redefining Populism as a Political Alternative

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

"My personal political convictions are rooted in the populist political traditions of western Canada." - Preston Manning

Populism can be described as a reactionary political expression, often rooted in a sense of persecution.

It can be "irrational, regressive, anti-intellectual and paranoid" (1) which in many ways describes the new American Tea party gang.

Populist movements are neither exclusively right nor left, as they can manifest themselves into fascism, Marxism, communism or democracy. Any movement driven by the masses.

But what is interesting about Reform movement populism, is that it was not bottom up, but top down. It was hatched and contrived by an "elite" group of four individuals: the multi-millionaire Francis Winspear. President of the Canada West Foundation, which was created to address Western grievances, Stan Roberts. Son of the former premier of Alberta, Preston Manning. And the controversial right-wing Canadian journalist, publisher and editor, Ted Byfield.

And the party did not emerge, as many believe, in protest over the National Energy Policy or Mulroney's decision to grant Montreal the maintenance contract for CF-18 fighter jets, instead of Manitoba, as he'd promised.

They were only necessary tools to further inflame western grievances.

The idea for this party originated in the 1960's when Ernest and Preston Manning wrote a little book called Political Realignment, which was a plan to reinvent Canadian conservatism, and move it sharply to the right. The concept for the National Citizens Coalition actually came from that book.

But the Mannings knew that they would have to wait until the next wave of white hot anger before they could act.

By the People But Not For the People

When Preston Manning began organizing the Reform movement, he studied the success of the Social Credit Party that enjoyed an enormous victory in 1935, and ruled Alberta for decades. But while William Aberhart could be said to be left wing, wanting to help those who were so poor "in the midst of plenty", Ernest Manning abandoned those notions, as he instead adopted neoconservative principles.

In 1943, premier William Aberhart died and was succeeded by a devout follower, Ernest Manning, who even more fervently preached a linkage between religious fundamentalism and right-wing free enterprise. The oil boom, which occurred shortly thereafter, further reinforced the political acceptability of Manning's ideology. Moreover, the boom also brought the considerable influence of the largely American-owned oil and gas industry to bear upon Alberta's political culture. Nowhere was this more the case than in Calgary.

The relatively few Americans who came to Alberta in the postwar era had a notable social and political impact. In the early years of the boom, a majority of the senior management of the major oil companies ... were from California, Oklahoma, Texas, and Louisiana. From 1955 to 1970, nine of the fifteen presidents of Calgary's exclusive Petroleum club were Americans.... Like their counterparts in the United States, they often held strong right-wing views." In short, the American-owned oil and gas industry held considerable influence in Calgary. (2)

And the American-owned oil and gas industry still have a considerable influence in this country, under the movement's new name: The Conservative Party of Canada, led by Preston Manning's former lieutenant, one Stephen Harper.

Sources:

1. Of Passionate Intensity: Right-Wing Populism and the Reform Party of Canada. By Trevor Harrison Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1995. ISBN: 0-8020-7204-6, Pg. 7

2. Harrison, 1995, Pg. 29-30

Ted Byfield and the Company of the Cross

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

In June of 2003, little more than a year after winning the leadership of the Alliance Party of Canada, Stephen Harper told members of the Civitas Society that he would now be embracing the support of the Christian right in Canada. Looking on with approval was long time mentor, and a founding member of the Reform Party, Ted Byfield.

He had been there in the early days when Harper was first cutting his political teeth and was in attendance when he delivered his "Achieving Economic Justice in Confederation" speech at the opening assembly of the Reform party on October 1, 1987.

In his presentation, Harper recited a litany of western grievances, from Macdonald's National Policy to 'the unlimited appetite of the Welfare State for tax grabs' and 'the special treatment accorded the Province of Quebec' in the form of transfer payments 'paid exclusively by Western Canada.' He then stated his reasons for believing that the existing political parties were incapable of correcting these injustices ... But Harper's comments regarding the Conservative party were the most telling, revealing implicitly where the new party believed its greatest potential support lay:

"... the Mulroney government has shown itself far too willing to back down on the issues that matter to its political base. We must serve notice to the Red Tory leadership that we will provide its Western supporters an option they can desert to en masse should they, for any reason, fail to successfully deliver on [free trade] or any other major initiative of importance to Western Canada. (1)

Manning would call his throwing down of the gauntlet speech the best of the weekend and Stephen Harper would then be named the head of Reform policy, and would serve as Manning's lieutenant. The same role that father Ernest Manning had played for William Aberhart, decades before.

Ted Byfeld had played an integral role in the formation of the party, through his Alberta Report magazine. He not only advertised their conventions and assemblies but before it's formation, he began running columns suggesting that it was time for a new Western party. The seed was planted and bore fruit on that fateful weekend in Winnipeg.

Things could have gone quite differently for Ted Byfield after a tragedy and controversy that continued to rage for several years after. It ended on a lake in Ontario but began several years before.

Company of the Cross and the St. John's Schools

Ted Byfield was a journalist who began his career as a copy boy for the Washington Post. Returning to Canada in 1948, he wrote for the Ottawa Journal, the Timmins Daily Press and later the Winnipeg Free Press. In the 1950s, he underwent a religious conversion after reading books by C.S. Lewis and G. K. Chesterton.

Inspired, he joined the Anglican Church and working through them opened a private Christian school; Saint John's Cathedral Boys' School, and in 1962 left journalism to teach there full time. In 1968 he opened another near Edmonton and later a third in Ontario.

The schools were said to be cult like, run by a lay religious order, the Company of the Cross, who lived in a communal apartment building, and were paid a mere dollar a day. When Byfield started his magazine in 1973, he used the same group to create and deliver the publications, which regaled against things like homosexuality, abortion, the public education system, crime and prostitution.

The students at his schools didn't fare much better than the staff. They did all the janitorial work, cooking and serving food, cleaning the kennels of the sled dogs they raised, and even making and selling processed meat products door-to-door for fundraising (hopefully not from the sled dogs they raised). Byfield and co-founder of the schools, Frank Wiens, believed that boys were not challenged by the education system or by society in general, so pushed them to their breaking points to "build character", and if they didn't toe the line, they were dealt with a "flat stick across the seat of the pants."

In 1974 the National Film Board produced a glowing documentary about the schools:

St. John's Cathedral Boys' School, at Selkirk, Manitoba, is the most demanding outdoor school in North America, but it cannot accommodate all the students who would like to enroll. Boys of thirteen to fifteen begin with an initiation tougher than they have ever faced: paddling canoes through some five hundred kilometers of wilderness in two weeks, portaging and camping all the way, learning not only outdoor lore but cooperation and self-confidence as well.

But then in 1978 a gruelling canoe trip turned deadly for the Ontario campus. "The tragedy occurred after a group of 27 boys, aged between 10 and 15, and four instructors from St. John's School of Ontario, in Claremont, northeast of Toronto, began canoeing up Lake Timiskaming, about 370 kilometres northwest of Ottawa." Twelve boys between the ages of 12 and 14 and one instructor were drowned. (3)

There had been storm warnings earlier in the day that had either been ignored or missed.

James Raffan wrote a book about the tragedy, and took issue with the schools, that he stated were little more than sweatshops. He also expressed surprise with the attitudes of the parents and staff after the deaths. They seemed to be very defensive of the school's program, and unwilling to cast or share blame. (4)

However a law suit filed years later revealed the horrendous details of life at one of the schools.

A private Christian boys residential school near Edmonton, renowned for its tough discipline, has been sued by a former student for alleged physical and mental torture during and after a wilderness trip more than a quarter-century ago ... in the 14-page document he "was forcefully exposed to experiences on the trip that put his life, health and safety at risk."

The 10-day trip, which began on Sept. 2, 1976 -- the day after the then 13-year-old boy arrived at the school near Stony Plain, 30 kilometres west of Edmonton -- was comprised of a 100-kilometre hike through steep mountain passes and a 500-kilometre canoe trip through some of the most treacherous parts of the North Saskatchewan River.

"The plaintiff states that the defendant's putting his life at risk by forcing him as a 13-year-old boy, untrained, unprepared and unsuitable to participate in the dangerous and unsafe physical activities of the wilderness trip, such as the long and arduous canoe trip often through treacherous waters, as well as its other conduct and treatment of him, amounted to a callous and wanton disregard of his safety and well-being and of his civil rights and a betrayal of his trust," the claim alleges.

The claim says the school's staff picked on and encouraged other students to pick on the weak, subjecting Birkin to "public ridicule, contempt, humiliation, degradation and sadistic and verbal abuse." Birkin spent 10 days in Stony Plain Hospital following the trip, suffering from ulcers on his feet and legs and blistering on his thighs. According to hospital records, the claim says, when Birkin was admitted he had a large bruised area and linear marks on his buttocks which he told a doctor had come from being beaten with a stick to make him hike faster.

He claims that while he was on the canoe portion of the trip, when he was exhausted and unable to keep up with the five other student paddlers, he was
repeatedly struck in the lower back with a heavy wooden paddle. ... It is not the first major claim of negligence against Saint John's School, which has an enrolment of about 130 students and 30 staff and is located on 110 hectares of bush, park and farmland.

A 15-year-old boy, Matt Riddel, sued the school for $1.7 million in 1996 after he lost nine toes to frostbite on a winter camping trip. He sustained his injuries during a four-day, 50-kilometre snowshoe and dogsled expedition, under the supervision of the school's teachers, in which temperatures dropped to -28 C.

The schools are all closed now and his magazines defunct, but Byfield has moved on to other things. Besides being a founder of the Civitas Society, he also helped to found the Canadian Christian Coalition, based on the American counterpart, after attending a Washington Convention in 1995. Jason Kenney is also a founder of CCC and a founding member of Civitas.

Sources:

1. Right-Wing Populism and the Reform Party of Canada. By Trevor Harrison Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1995. ISBN: 0-8020-7204-6, pg. 116

2. Harrison, 1995, Pg. 60

3. Ville Marie, QB Canoe Accidents, Winnipeg Free Press Manitoba , June 14, 1978

4. Deep Waters: Courage, Character and the Lake Timiskaming Canoeing Tragedy, By James Raffan, Harper Collins, 2002

5. School sued after 26 years, By Daryl Slade, Calgary Herald, February 08, 2003

6. The Christian Coalition Comes to Canada, by Kim Goldberg, The Albion Monitor, May 5, 1996