Nick's Café Canadien

Is it just me, or has this week been a veritable festival of democracy? It’s high time, then, for the last edition of my annual endorsitorial for the most inconsequential election of the lot—the Executive of the University of Alberta Students’ Union.

Since I’m releasing my endorsements much later than usual, and after the first day of voting, I don’t expect that anything I say will swing any votes. But I don’t expect that I’ll need to. Without any referenda or plebiscites on the ballot, if you’re voting in the first place, you’re probably informed enough to know that the VPSL race is perhaps the only one without a single, obvious choice.

I’d first like to commend The Gateway for putting a stellar panel together for this year’s Hack-o-Rama-of-sorts, one in which every participant has substantially more experience than I do in navigating the workings of the Students’ Union (even if one of them happens to be a domain-name highway bandit). I can’t say I have a lot to add to their analysis apart from weighing in on where their endorsements are split, so I’ll devote most of my attention to making fun of the speeches at the Myer forum.

For previous editions, please see: 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004. Without further ado, let’s get endorsing.

Insert coin to continue… »

This blog has been quoted on a Students’ Union executive candidate’s election campaign materials. I am complete.

As someone who has dipped into the deep, dark wading pool of bona fide published film criticism, I’ve been mentally prepared for this moment for some time now. I always imagined that it would go something like this:

“Hoot is the kind of film that critics hate to hate, an abortive marriage of the well intentioned and the patently ridiculous.

How it sustains a façade of social importance for 90 minutes without presenting its characters with a single challenging decision is a mystery better answered by scholars of ineffective propaganda.”

— Nicholas Tam, “Film forgets to tell us why we should give a Hoot and not pollute” (4 May 2006)

“‘Challenging!’ (Vue Weekly)”

— Hoot, promotional materials

Instead, it went something like this:

“Wow. I’m not sure what to say. I knew my elementary-school busmate Bryant Lukes was throwing himself on the hot coals crotch-first without any pants on, and I suspected he would deliver the standard speech about how having no SU experience is an asset because he’s a fresh face with an outside voice (there’s one every year). Fine—that kind of error is usually remedied by a crushing loss in the election followed by a disillusioning year or two on Students’ Council.

But when he started blithering about, well, virtually everything outside the VPA portfolio up to and including the survival of the human species, and did so with utter seriousness and conviction, his speech gravitated beyond the surreal and into the domain of the legendary. Identifying his primary credential as being a Dion delegate at the Liberal leadership convention was the icing on the cake. I feel sorry for the guy: The Gateway is going to eat him alive.”

— Nicholas Tam, “Vote like Nick and win: SU Elections 2007″ (5 March 2007)

“‘… his (Lukes’) speech gravitated beyond the surreal and into the domain of the legendary.’ — Nick Tam blogger”

— “What others are saying”, 2008 campaign brochures, Bryant Lukes for Vice-President (Academic)

When I write about the Myer Horowitz election forum on Monday, could somebody remind me to set my ambiguity to “stun”?

I have remained silent about the Bear Scat debacle over the course of its development this summer, but I think it’s high time to decloak.

Any casual observer of student politics over the span of more than a few years can tell you that between the quick turnover time between successive executives or councils and the erratic fluctuation of institutional memory (if any is still around to fluctuate), nothing sticks, and apathy comes naturally. I’m long past the point where I can rely on the student government to commit to anything reliably, and you should be too.

That said, the U of A Students’ Union occasionally bumbles its way into something that actually impacts students, and that’s when it’s time to intervene—if it’s not too late. As such, I am going to provide a cursory analysis, and at the very end, propose a course of action.

Insert coin to continue… »

I am in the middle of what is and probably will remain my busiest week of the academic year, which might explain why I’ve logged as much time as I have engrossed in Fire Emblem, shedding nostalgic happy-tears for the Disneyland fireworks, not winning the McGoun Cup in spite of only having to argue for abolishing animal “rights” (by the way, a thanks to my partner Sharon and congratulations to Brent and Marek), and dumping a few words on the Internet where they won’t be marked for credit. In the parlance of Ferdinand de Saussure, I’ll just assume my homework assignments will synchronically emerge all at once as the articulated difference of each other.

First of all: no complaints about the SU election. I know I gave Board of Governors Representative-Elect Paul Chiswell a bit of a drubbing in my endorsements, but after listening to some convincing arguments that I should reconsider, my ballot ended up reading: 1) Eruvbetine, 2) Chiswell, 3) Guiney. Given that Chiswell topped Guiney by a mere nine-vote margin on the second ballot, I think we can safely say that little last-minute decisions like mine tipped the balance. This is one example of where it is okay to change your mind about something at the last minute without telling anybody until much later. It’s not, you know, a disingenuous betrayal of fundamental ethical principles, an act of complete disrespect for your friends, or anything like that.

Moving right along, then. I never did write about how this month marks the 50th anniversary of Edmonton’s very own Yardbird Suite, which means they’re running a terrific concert series until the date on the calendar rolls back to 1. If I ever make it as a credible musician (by the standards of the best musicians, whose opinions are the only ones that count), I’ll owe a debt to this place, if only because their Tuesday jam sessions are one of the best opportunities that exist for youngsters who think they can play jazz to prove it (and subsequently realize in variously-proportioned equilibria that in some ways they can, and in some ways they can’t).

Naturally, I attended the opening show on 2 March featuring Chris Andrew, Tommy Banks and Ken Chaney five feet away from me on the Yamaha grand. (The one they pull out on Tuesdays is a Baldwin.) Needless to say, I managed to get prime seats by showing up right when the doors opened, partly because I learned my lesson the last time I tried to see the good Senator play and the Governor-General took my seat.

The curious thing about leaving your coat and Bacardi on your table so you can order a bowl of popcorn at the bar is that everybody presumes your entire table is occupied by an invisible power elite with so much confidence in its muscle, it doesn’t even see the need to guard its drinks. So the fine establishment on 11 Tommy Banks Way filled to capacity, but the table right by the piano looked effectively reserved. I didn’t keep all the seats to myself, of course. A family of four walked in a few minutes before the fashionably-late-as-always commencement of the show, and the when-will-my-popcorn-be-done roulette wheel determined them the lucky winners.

Nice folks. Impeccably nuclear: a sax-playing father in the employ of the Anglican Church, a singing mother undergoing a perpetual shoulder massage, a teenage daughter who plays the piano at a performing arts school, and a younger son with his feet up on the edge of the stage who had never seen a jazz combo before. And a couch-to-television distance away, Senator Tommy Banks playing “Misty” for me. I’d reserved a table for the American Dream. Or something very much like it, but with a certain element of neighbourly charity that Canadians like to think of as their national characteristic, so long as they’re not affiliated with opposing hockey teams, or didn’t ask and didn’t tell. If you’ve never had the pleasure of enjoying the music that speaks to you right next to an equally enthusiastic father explaining the show to his son in the same way an Shakespeare aficionado would initiate someone new to Elizabethan drama who is captivated by the ghost-conversing, madness-feigning, spy-killing, pirate-escaping, the-rest-is-silencing action onstage without really understanding the words, try it sometime. It’s great blogging material for those long nights when you have too much work to do.

Apparently they have three pianos in their house, and I’m invited to play them. In retrospect, I should have jotted down the address.

On a final note, watch this video of my kid brother skating, and tell me, at 0:54, if he is not a gentleman.

I apologize to those of you expecting a clever and indirect post title akin to my Students’ Union endorsements in years past. This post is being syndicated on Facebook, see, and I need people to take notice.

So, in case you attend the University of Alberta and are at all taken by surprise: polls are open Wednesday and Thursday, 7-8 March. Ballots are preferential: you rank your candidates from top to bottom until you hit “none of the above,” which actually means “none of the below,” as a vote for NATB means you would rather have an invalidated election and a subsequent by-election for the vacancy instead of one of the remaining candidates. I exercise this option often, and so should you.

While I’m not as up to the minute on SU issues as I used to be, which means I won’t be quick on the trigger to call out the candidates for lying about the extent of their accomplishments, I’ve done my share of research and you should listen to me. Without further ado, I’ll begin with the referendum/plebiscite questions and then proceed to the electable positions.

Coke Plebiscite: I’m no fan of monopolies, but I will be voting Yes in support of a renewal of the SU’s exclusivity agreement with Coca-Cola. On principle, when a company gives you stuff in exchange for a concession that’s going to happen anyway, take it. For example – to be (only somewhat) hypothetical – if some diamond company wants to buy us a new engineering research lab with their conflict diamond money for the price of putting their name on it, the result of saying Yes is that you get the building, and the result of saying No is that you don’t get the building. There is no ethical impact either way, unless you really, really put a lot of stock in making yourself feel better at the material expense of the student body. Similarly, with the Coke plebiscite, a No vote has no effect on Coca-Cola’s corporate practices, or even its presence as a campus monopoly. It does mean that the SU’s access to a whole lot of money disappears. Is this organization here to serve students or not? Vote Yes.

I’m going to do something very unorthodox here, and direct you to the thorough coverage already provided by Ross Prusakowski, who has kindly saved me the effort of doing the research on what the relevant numbers are and how the money is spent. Given the disingenuity and misconduct of the No side throughout (and preceding) the campaign season, they’ve earned a slap in the face.

U-Pass Referendum: I am voting Yes. I voted No to the U-Pass plebiscite in the 2004 election, but circumstances have changed, and it is time to go back and evaluate all of the relevant questions. Will a Yes vote produce binding results? Yes. Is the exemption scheme sufficient? I believe so. Is the price acceptable? About as much as it could be: I don’t imagine that they could ever get it under $75/semester, so one should only vote against this to throw out the deal altogether, not to hold out for a cheaper fare. Is public transit in Edmonton and the surrounding area worth paying for? Actually, it’s a shambles, but the added revenue and incentive for investment will only serve to establish better transit service for all Edmontonians.

The only reason to oppose this would be on a matter of principle: if you are fundamentally against the idea that the many should pay for something for something that will only be used by the less-than-many. While I typically hold that position myself, this is a special case simply because of the sizable benefits, and because of a certain circularity that would be broken: individuals are primarily as dependent on vehicles as they are because the transit system does not meet their needs. Solve the latter, and you address the former. If you’ve already paid for a U-Pass, that’s a positive incentive to get your money’s worth. Consider this: I estimate there is already massive fare evasion on the LRT on the part of students who just need a quick hop down a few stops, especially those who live in residence and are already overcharged elsewhere. ETS may as well be empowered to cover the costs. Vote Yes.

President: There are no fewer than four joke candidates for President: Chuck Norris, Ursa Minor, the disembodied voice of George Rho, and Cody Lawrence. With one exception, none of them are substantial enough, or even funny enough, to merit a rank preceding None of the Above. (I am rewarding Ursa Minor with third place for effort, a formidable Myer Horowitz performance, and my personal vested interest in a robot-friendly campus.) We are left, then, with a choice between two candidates of considerable experience and erudition.

On one hand, we have Michael Janz, who is, on paper, the model populist imported from Lister Hall (who will, therefore, probably win) – and that quick description perhaps disguises the fact that he has been, over two terms, without question the most effective LHSA President I have seen in my five years on campus. Moreover, his skills are transferrable. Lest anyone mistake him for a token Student Life-centric residence candidate à la Jordan Blatz, Janz is not an outsider to the SU’s operations: he has the relevant breadth of experience on Council, committees and student groups.

On the other hand, we have Amanda Henry, who has two years of SU experience in the Academic portfolio and all the requisite connections and bargaining positions already in place. Her year as VPA has been, to my knowledge, unproblematic. I don’t question her grasp of how the SU works, or her willingness to take a strong bargaining position in relation to the University to ensure student initiatives and ideas get through the hoops.

So it comes down to platforms. I don’t expect all of Janz’s initiatives to unfold: TA language proficiency comes up every year and nothing has been done, and I don’t see that we’d be much closer to a usable, profitable Powerplant even with a massive study space conversion, as much as I like the idea. At the same time, I don’t think anybody ever expected headway to be made with respect to the Aramark contract either, and Janz was the guy who managed it. His commitment to student groups is a major point in favour, and his focus on small, achievable initiatives instead of idealistic lobbying is understandable.

Henry, however, has shown that advocacy at the University level can work. Her platform is nothing if not robust, and acknowledges that many of her opponent’s more local initiatives can be delegated to the SU’s hired staff. She is experienced in navigating the apparatus above the Students’ Union in the capacity of a representative and negotiator, not only in relation to her opponents, but even most of the past Presidents I can remember. I am wary of her being the more confrontational of the front-running candidates, but it may just be part of the election rhetoric, and I do believe she will produce results where others have failed in the past. A Henry-led SU may be a status quo SU, but an improvement nonetheless in practical terms.

My ballot: 1) Amanda Henry, 2) Michael Janz, 3) Ursa Minor, 4) None of the Above/Below/Others. With one of those three, the SU is in good hands, and I hope whoever wins incorporates the ideas of the other two.

Vice-President Academic: Wow. I’m not sure what to say. I knew my elementary-school busmate Bryant Lukes was throwing himself on the hot coals crotch-first without any pants on, and I suspected he would deliver the standard speech about how having no SU experience is an asset because he’s a fresh face with an outside voice (there’s one every year). Fine – that kind of error is usually remedied by a crushing loss in the election followed by a disillusioning year or two on Students’ Council.

But when he started blithering about, well, virtually everything outside the VPA portfolio up to and including the survival of the human species, and did so with utter seriousness and conviction, his speech gravitated beyond the surreal and into the domain of the legendary. Identifying his primary credential as being a Dion delegate at the Liberal leadership convention was the icing on the cake. I feel sorry for the guy: The Gateway is going to eat him alive.

Bobby Samuel’s Myer speech was not as strong as it could have been, but from his campaign materials, goals and SU experience, I can tell that he is a typically deserving, if not spectacular, VPA-winning candidate. I also admired his tact in not burdening (dignifying?) the Lukes campaign with a question at the forum. He even managed to take his opponent’s oddball question (“How will you address climate change?”) and bring it back on topic. He knew what he was running for, and he knew why he was there. Here’s a hint: it wasn’t because some ex-hack he asked thought Pierre Trudeau might have been good in the position.

My ballot: 1) Bobby Samuel, 2) None of the Above (i.e. not Lukes). I expect this to be settled on the first ballot, and I’m really curious how big the margin will be.

Vice-President External: Dollansky has the experience. Under preferential balloting I’m willing to throw my vote at the joke candidate as long as it’s good enough, but Dollansky also took on his opponent directly, and delivered Soundwave a decisive defeat. He would be a winner any year.

1) Steven Dollansky, 2) Soundwave. And I’m curious as to how the margin of victory will compare to that of the VPA race.

Vice-President Operations/Finance: So let me get this straight: a guy named Gamble runs for the Finance position, and doesn’t leverage the obvious. For shame.

That said, the VPOF race is relatively straightforward: if you know what the hell you’re talking about, and you know what the budget looks like, and you don’t seem to have an established record of stealing money from student groups, you might just be qualified. By this metric, one of these candidates is not like the other. Eamonn Gamble knows what he’s dealing with, even if he doesn’t have a clue what to do with it; Jesse Hahn doesn’t. I’m going to park my vote with experience. I know I did exactly the opposite last year when I voted for Cunningham over Chapman and Lewis, but let’s ignore that for the sake of this argument. If Jesse Hahn doesn’t know enough about the SU to respond to questions about his lack of experience with a simple “see Chris Cunningham,” he clearly hasn’t done his homework. I should note, however, that I have extreme reservations about Gamble – as with Janz, his Powerplant plan forays deep into the woods of let’s-try-this experimentation – and I’m only placing him first because I still prefer him to the other guy. Even if Gamble doesn’t get anything done, he would be the preferred status quo caretaker.

1) Eamonn Gamble, 2) None of the Above (i.e. not Hahn).

Vice-President Student Life: Like Steven Dollansky, Chris Le would probably make a solid run for my vote even if this election were properly contested, making this an easy acclamation. Chubby Puff Ball didn’t show up.

My ballot: 1) Chris Le, 2) None of the Chubby Puff Balls. (The real race, as we all know, is between Chubby Puff Ball, Soundwave, and Bryant Lukes.)

Board of Governors Representative: I’ve been given assurances that Prem Eruvbetine’s past performance on Students’ Council has been stellar, if sporadic. Of the three candidates, he is the one with the most credibility in terms of his background in student politics. To me, this race is between him and Adam Guiney. Whereas Chiswell doesn’t know what he’s talking about, and his grasp of the position extends to the usual clichés about how as an undergrad rep he’ll cheer for undergrads over research, Eruvbetine and Guiney have specific ideas about what to bring to the Board level and how to bring it.

I was tempted to give the edge to Guiney, in spite of his horrific posters: he came off at the Myer forum as the better spoken and better researched of the two, which bodes well considering what the position entails. I also have concerns about Eruvbetine’s passive stance on how the Board of Governors rep should communicate with students, which came up in a forum question: it seems to be reducible to website feedback and an open-door policy in his office. But after sifting through the campaign literature, I remain convinced that Eruvbetine is the one with the more comprehensive record and the one most likely to show up prepared to be effective. The initiatives he intends to bring to the Board are also broader in scope, yet achievable. To him, student advocacy is more than just a money issue. Guiney won the Myer Horowitz, but after looking at his limited campaign materials, I’m not convinced he’s even wholly literate. Chiswell isn’t a factor.

1) Prem Eruvbetine, 2) Adam Guiney, 3) None of the Above (i.e. not Chiswell).

And just for the heck of it, I’m going to rank Myer forum performances: 1) Chris Samuel (U-Pass Yes) for possibly the best speech since Mustafa Hirji’s eviscerating U-Pass No in 2004; 2) Steven Dollansky, for answering Soundwave’s challenge in style; 3) Ursa Minor, for one of the more elaborate joke candidate performances I’ve seen, though the stilted and incomprehensible question to an absent Chuck Norris fell flat. Honourable mention to the memorable Bryant Lukes, because if this was all some kind of sick joke, it was brilliant.

Between Chris Samuel’s speech and Chris Jones’ public admonishment of the forum questioners for being so blatantly planted, I think we’ve seen the last hurrah of the legendary Hack Club 7. For the first time since its inception, it wasn’t quorate at the Myer Horowitz. Next year, it is likely that its only attendee will be Gateway Business Manager Steve Smith, who sat in the shadows today and presumably manipulated the proceedings from afar. They went out with a bang, though, and it’s a fitting end to an era.

Fine, fine, fine, fine, fine.

Look, if you care, you’ve probably already voted. As such, and given that most of you won’t get around to reading this before the polls close, this isn’t really an endorsitorial. As I was starting to write something along those lines on Monday night just before I got wind of Chelli’s unfortunate disqualification, I came to the realization that this year didn’t offer me a whole lot to endorse. There were several races to the bottom, and at the time I hadn’t quite decided how well None of the Above would fare on my ballot. Besides, I figure that if you’re smart enough to read this blog, you’re smart enough to not vote for Greg German.

So here’s how I ranked the candidates (as far as I can remember), with minimal disclosure of supporting rationale:

President: None of the Above, Samantha Power, Greg German. I would have voted for Michelle Kelly were she still in the race. Though Sam came off as the most knowledgeable, professional and prepared candidate, I have too many fundamental disagreements with her on principle and too little admiration of her accomplishments to date to justify a clear first. In a two-horse race a #1 for NOTA works out to a vote for her anyway, and my rankings are both a protest and a Stop German. Sam would serve as both the better President and the better placeholder.

Also, Stephen Kirkham should have gone ahead with the Bear Scat joke campaign. This year, it was fully winnable. Potential to be the greatest joke candidate since Space Moose? Absolutely. What a shame.

VP Academic: Amanda Henry has earned my rubber stamp.

VP External: None of the Above, Dave Cournoyer, Blythe Morrow, Damini Mohan. It was a race to the bottom. Dave lost me with the fetish for political policies. Blythe lost me with her seething (and moreover, undirected) anger at the Myer forum. Damini lost me twice the moment I saw “ATA” and “CFS” converge on her handbills. Lesson learned: when in doubt, even the Liberal with the crappy blog may end up on top.

VP Operations/Finance: Chris Cunningham, None of the Above, Theresa Chapman, Cameron Lewis. Cunningham doesn’t have a clue about the SU, but the more I heard him exude his businessman’s idealism, the more I liked him. Here’s a man who would invest in zeppelins in the wake of a Hindenburg out of patriotic ambition. He really doesn’t have any idea what he’s in for, but I’m dying to see what he’d manage to do with the position. (However, if he wins, I’ll have to apologize to him personally.)

As for the other two, I don’t for a moment doubt Theresa Chapman’s enthusiasm and commitment, or that she works hard and pays her taxes. I do doubt her understanding of the position, her naïveté about everything, and her ability to write coherently (see the Webboard for details). As for Cam, who somehow ran a fluffed-up paper-credential-driven campaign with less presence than Samuel’s run for BOG…

“I will. Take care of your money. We’re not making this up.”

(Tired? Uninspiring? So was his campaign.)

VP Student Life: Sarah Kalil, Omer Yusuf, None of the Above, Amanda-Leigh Hanson. Figures – the only race of conventional strength, and it has to be the bogus seat on the Executive. Sarah’s the best: she knows the limitations of the SL position, both necessary and crippling, and she also recognizes that students are best served through decentralized programming and Student Groups in particular, which I will say without reservation is the SU service with the most direct and relevant effect on students short of Bear Scat.

Omer would be an acceptable victor, but he doesn’t quite fit the portfolio as a character quite the way Sarah does, and I think he would be more useful elsewhere. Hanson didn’t race to the bottom like some of the candidates in other races, but she struck me as somebody impractical in all the ways that are best holed up in APIRG.

Board of Governors: Of course I approved Chris Samuel. To me, the question isn’t whether or not running a $0 campaign should speak ill of him – it’s about how far up he’ll go. I want to see him break 80% for fun and sport.

Physical Activity Complex: No. This plebiscite asked a stupider question than half of the Jones referenda.

Campus-Wide Tobacco Ban: Yes, and it’s in spite of Shereen Kangarloo’s every effort to lose my vote. Chris Samuel is the first argument for running a zero-dollar campaign. This is the second. We’re talking about a hot-button debate as topical as the prohibition of tobacco, and that’s the best she can do? Her money would have been better spent as a drop in the bucket to fight lung cancer.

As for my vote: I do not make any money from campus tobacco sales. I do not have any intention of making money off campus tobacco sales. I have no interest in there being smoking, or smoke, on campus. I do have an interest in cutting through shortest paths in the Main Quad without having to trace a curveball trajectory around a cloud of stink. The personal benefits outweigh the costs.

And there goes ten or twenty minutes I’d rather have spent writing about Crash.

The Students’ Union Webboard has returned. This is a public service announcement and not in any way an unrelenting squeal of joy. In the months leading up to its disappearance back in early 2005 the Webboard’s utility and entertainment value were already in decline, but the new registration policy (requiring members to provide a unique university-affiliated e-mail address) is a sound one that will hopefully keep a lid on the overabundance of anonymous sockpuppetry that plagued the establishment prior to its subsequent implosion.

I’m glad to see that existing user records and the posts of the old regime have been preserved in full… or not. One notices that my triple-crossing Diplomacy victory as Italy is conspicuously missing. I demand answers.