“If I had a world of my own,” said Alice, “everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary-wise; what it is it wouldn't be, and what it wouldn't be, it would. You see?”
And in such a world, there is to be no more talk of running steel erections through a UNESCO World Heritage site.
He has decided to go around the park. According to the voice of the cabinet minister, He said He was only kidding on that one.
Quite the yuck it was too.
Not once, but twice and the second time with sprinkles: better to wreck the park than risk Granny’s heart surgery or some such.
There are only two possible real reasons for this change of direction.
Either the federal government told the province officially to get stuffed or the Premier has a poll that shows the public are adamantly and persistently opposed to his plan to run power lines through Gros Morne to bring Labrador power to the townies.
The last time the Premier shifted directions this abruptly and unexpectedly – the flag thing – he had a poll that showed the strategy was far less brilliant than thought by the ones who thunk it up in the first place.
In this case, the feds might have also told him to forget any plans to try and run the lines through the park, easement or no easement. You can see a clue to that possibility in the number of times the Premier made reference to needing federal cash for what was supposed to be a go-it-alone option. He keeps talking about federal money like you’d expect him to say if they’d turned him down flat. They said no, so now they have to compensate me for the inconvenience; that sort of thing.
But instead he is claiming credit for making the momentous and correct decision and trying to pretend he didn’t make the incorrect one the first time.
And then persistently, stubbornly, unreasonably stick to it for half a year.
The federal government is under no obligation to pay a nickel for running the power to the townies. That’s all the line on the island will do, you see. There’s nothing in it about running run power to the Yanks. no matter how many times Danny Williams has tried to claim federal political commitments, there’s not a shred of evidence any ever existed.
Whoever decided, at least the right decision was made in the end. It’s just that in this world where nothing is as it appears, the people who fell down the rabbit hole in 2003 will likely never know.
-srbp-