Our Secret Nation #nlpoli

Comedian Greg Malone is writing a book.

The title is Don’t tell the Newfoundlanders:  the true story of Newfoundland’s Confederation with Canada.

It is non-fiction.

Well, supposedly it is non-fiction.

That’s because any book or article with the “true story” in the title is pretty much guaranteed to be full of plenty of popular myths, fairy tales, folklore and just plain old bullshit.

The likelihood of getting the untrue story from any “true story”  goes off the dial when the book is about Confederation.  You see, since 1949, Newfoundland has had a thriving conspiracy industry centred on Confederation.  It rivals any of the grassy knoll, Area 51 stuff in the United States on any level.

And when you dig a little deeper you know you are going to get the real story that is as authentic as you might expect from an ersatz Barbara Frum. 

Last year, Mary Walsh interviewed Greg about his book when she filled in at The Current.  That’s a link to the audio and appropriately enough Greg follows on a discussion of humour in politics.  The blurb describes Greg’s book this way:

And he has uncovered what he says was a conspiracy to make sure Newfoundlanders did join Canada.

Yes, friends.

It is the same old schtick. 

Such old schtick, in fact, that historian Jeff Webb has already dealt with it. Such old schtick, in fact, someone made a movie out of it.

And it really is the same… old… schtick.  Malone credits the late Jim Halley as one of his inspirations for digging into Confederation.  With that starting point, you can be pretty much assured of what is coming. 

Malone doesn’t disappoint on that front.  Malone talks With Walsh about some Canadians lusting after iron ore and hydro-electricity in Labrador, the British/Canadian war debt written off against Confederation and all the rest of the stories that have been swirling around since the late 1940s.

There doesn’t look to be a fact, detail or argument from Malone you can’t find somewhere else.  And, inevitably, there are likely plenty of details Malone just never considered because they didn’t fit into his world view.

Apparently, the book is set for a Christmas release. 

- srbp -

Related:

• Fantasy Island:  Flags of our Fathers edition
• Le declin de l’empire
• A tourist in her own land

The limits of myth busting #nlpoli

Coming to The Rooms in February:

Wednesday, February 22, 7 pm
The Limits of Myth Busting:
Popular and Professional Histories of Newfoundland and Labrador

What is the relationship between myth and history? And are myths rooted in history? Join Dr. Jerry Bannister as he shares his thoughts on the role of historians and popular mythologies in understanding our province’s past.

Mark your calendars.

This one should be as good as the last one.

- srbp -

Jeffrey Simpson hates Newfoundland

Well, not really.

But that's what the myth-mongers among us would have us believe.

The leading critic of Simpson's latest remarks has re-opened her blog to public view and has taken to slagging Simpson on whatever radio station has an open line show or a viewer call-back line.

Plus ca change.

What Simpson actually said is available through Offal News and Simpson's interview with CBC Radio's On the Go.

Just to show how much Simpson doesn't know about Newfoundland and Labrador - note the sarcasm - here's a column on the Churchill Falls contract from 1986.

As for Simpson's remarks on the impact of demographics, you can find similar arguments here at Bond Papers last fall and in October 2005. There is nothing new in Simpson's remarks and as Simpson told CBC radio, there are a great many leading figures in the province who have discussed the issue with him at length in private.

Your humble e-scribbler isn't a leading figure even in his own house, so draw your own conclusions on who Simpson speaks with when he comes here.

A pitiful contract
Jeffrey Simpson
The Globe and Mail
Toronto, Ont.: Jul 3, 1986.
pg. A.6

Come-By-Chance periodically provokes a nibble of interest from some Israeli or Arab consortium, but most Newfoundlanders have consigned it and the other industrial failures to the far corner of their collective memory.

Not so with Churchill Falls, the Labrador hydro-electric project whose iniquitous terms can stir indignation in any Newfoundlander.

Another Smallwood legacy, the Churchill Falls project allows Quebec to make a killing on Labrador power. Quebec buys Labrador power for the laughably low rate of 3 mills and sells it for many times that rate in the United States.

Put simply, Newfoundland is getting shafted by the deal. All legal challenges, presentations to the National Energy Board and appeals to Quebec's conscience, good name, patron saints and anything else Newfoundland could think of have failed.

Quebec, after all, has a 65- year contract freely entered into with an agent of the Newfoundland Government in 1969. The power started flowing in 1976, and Quebec has been raking in the profits ever since.

Worse still, the contract calls for steadily falling rates to be paid by Hydro-Quebec for the duration of the contract.

Every failed legal challenge by Newfoundland merely solidified the sanctity of the contract. The federal Government, knowing that Quebec has nearly 11 times more parliamentary seats than Newfoundland, has been reluctant to intervene.

Quebec is legally obligated to do nothing but keep taking Labrador power at a low price and selling it for what the market will bear. It has argued that without Hydro-Quebec's consent and money, Newfoundland could never have developed Labrador power, since Quebec stands between the Churchill River and potential export markets.

Under Rene Levesque and the Parti Quebecois Government, Quebec's position remained as unyielding as it was simple - a contract is a contract is a contract. That position echoed the one taken earlier in the 1970s by Liberal Premier Robert Bourassa.

Now Mr. Bourassa, who was returned to power last December, is making modest noises that perhaps Quebec might be flexible. Newfoundland formally presented new proposals to him in March, and Premier Brian Peckford wants a meeting in the coming months. Experts from Hydro-Quebec and Newfoundland Hydro have been meeting.

It is too early to know whether Quebec is serious or is merely making polite, inconsequential noises. The Churchill contract, enduringly important news in Newfoundland, stirs barely a flicker of interest in the navel-gazing Quebec media.

Any re-opening of the Churchill contract would have to be part of a broader package of developing the hydro potential of Gull Island, further along the Churchill River.

Whether Quebec is even interested in Gull Island depends, in part, on Mr. Bourassa's hydro priorities.

He is outspokenly wedded to James Bay II, and hasn't tipped his hand about Gull Island.

Mr. Bourassa, an avowed federalist, is not required to do anything to help Newfoundland, Canada's poorest province. He has the province over a barrel, and he can keep it there for as long as he wishes. A sense of decency and the spirit of federalism, however, should make him stop lording it over Newfoundland.

-srbp-