Everybody loves a good old-fashioned conspiracy theory. From the left side of the political spectrum—9/11 was an inside job—to the right—Obama's birth certificate is a fake—conspiracy theories try to explain the inexplicable in terms sinister, if understandable: the government did it; the government's hiding something.
Personally I think that the government isn't capable of pulling off a conspiracy. This is largely because the government is made up of people that are just like us. In fact, the similarities are so close that you could almost call government employees human: just as fallible as you or me, with their own unique quirks, biases and hang-ups.
In a way I think this is part of what makes government a thing to be limited because it gives great power to people as stupid and unstable as I am.
And even when the stupid and the unstable attempt to organize some kind of 'conspiracy', it's a pretty open affair. Take the BP oil spill, which Obama has been trying to capitalize upon to push for—you guessed it—energy reform. Political agenda, show thyself. It's a pretty naked attempt to take advantage of a disaster. While I won’t go so far as to call the BP spill engineered, I also think Obama shouldn't try to make political capital out of human misery.
Unfortunately, capitalizing on human misery seems to be a rapidly spreading mindset. As Sean Holman, the intrepid, independent journalist behind Public Eye Online (a Web-based compendium of political shenanigans in British Columbia) reports:
"Those with conspiratorial leanings often accuse governments of manufacturing crises to provide a pretext for controversial changes. But, in the [premier Gordon] Campbell administration, it's part of the job description for senior civil servants! The ministries of forests & range and environment are currently advertising for candidates to "fill positions within their executive ranks." And, according to a "role profile" attached to that advertisement, those hired are expected to demonstrate a number of behaviours including being able to "create a crisis to force change" so they can "capitalize on the best opportunity." The profile, which appears to apply to senior civil servants across government, goes onto state such decisions involve a "high level of risk," requiring executives to "acknowledge the ultimate consequences if they do not succeed.""
Sean then goes on to provide a copy of the aforementioned document, just in case you're having a hard time believing what you just read. It's a tough one to wrap your head around, to be sure.
Maybe it's a sign of how much I already distrusted BC's Liberal government that it doesn't particularly surprise me that they would be willing to spin a crisis for their own benefit. Someone more cynical than myself could remark that the BC Liberals are very good at manufacturing very genuine crises without even meaning to. After all, this is the same government that introduced a harmonized sales tax which combines both provincial and federal sales taxes into one. This arguably makes economic sense, but it was imposed just months after an election in which the BC Liberals gave no indication whatsoever that they were going to be doing so. This, combined with a variety of other scandals and mismanagements, has led to a rather large grassroots protest movement. There are even threats to start recalling members of the legislature from their seats if critics don't see the change that they want. It's sort of a Tea Party North only with more hippies.
So for a government that is having a very hard time gaining any political capital from any disaster, it's rather odd to see the province actively encouraging prospective ministerial executives to create even more of them.
Of course, these are just a couple of ministries in one government, with one job posting. It's not the end of the world, and perhaps too much should not be made of it. But then again, this is the same province in which many municipalities have moved very slowly on the very real threat posed by under-prepared forest fire-fighting measures, so it's not as if there isn't a lot of potential for crises to abound. An enterprising executive wouldn't have to work too hard in order to 'create a crisis to force change.'
As I said before, I'm not a conspiracy theorist and I believe in the supreme incompetence of government. But the next time we are told by the BC government that the province is neck-deep in some great problem or other, I admit that I'll probably be thinking twice as to the cause. Wouldn't you?
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I have only one word to say, "Let's recall those Liberal fascists." Ok, that was more than one word.
Ok, that was more than one word.
That's OK - we'll allow it :)