Piece Negotiations

Danny Williams and his followers love the word piece. They love it so much that they have created entirely new meanings for the word.

In Danspeak, "piece" seems to denote a project or initiative, though it's often hard to discern any rational meaning. Take, for example, this prattle to the Globe and Mail, in response to a question about the mythical fixed link, "Yeah, but it's not just a simple link but a major transportation piece that enables people to do a circuitous route. [In Quebec] they are extremely interested; we talked to them about it recently." Williams was obviously on a roll by this point in the interview, because he offered this follow-up comment: "Being a have-province is a huge piece for us psychologically."

Pieces may be physical, psychological, or eschatological, but one thing is for certain: they are always political. And in this polling season, the tea leaves show some interesting patterns. Williams may have been too busy to attend interprovicial meetings, but he had plenty of time to give interviews with Gordon Pitts and Dave Bartlett (the latter was excitedly touted as an exclusive). Neither Pitts nor Bartlett asked Williams why he is so popular, but they sounded eerily similar to Lisa Simpson, when she observed that Monty Burns' campaign had the momentum of a runaway freight train.

Pitts offered the best inadvertent humour, however. Not only does his interview quote Williams as claiming that, pace Labradore, half the province's population lives in or near St. John's, but it offers the amusing spectre of him touting the world-class facilities of the same university that he has helped to turn into a collective acting class.

But what do the two interviews reveal, aside from journalistic obsequiousness? The ABC virus has mutated into yet another form. The last time I checked, the Williams government had announced a new shaming initiative, whereby they would use their unique powers of moral suasion to pressure the federal government to support their fishery policies.

However, as should be expected for a government on the move, both the shaming and kiss-the-backsides initiatives have been replaced by a new optimistic fatalism. According to this doctrine, the Lower Churchill will get finished, sooner or later; the federal government will subsidize the project, sooner or later; and Williams will retire as premier, sooner or later.

If Williams sounded like Luke Skywalker last winter, now he's channeling Yoda. If he wanted to rip Harper's head off in February, now he's refraining from even uttering the name of his nemesis. If he was enraged at the Shaft, now he's at peace with the piece. Now the best trash talk he can offer is this exercise in tepidity: "I don't think, at times, the federal government gives it [Churchill Falls] the attention it deserves." In this moment of political Zen, it's not a question of how or why; it's merely a question of when. There is no try, only do!

This is the sound of one mouth flapping. While Williams has declared a temporary truce in trash talking the Tories, Gros Morne remains fair game. It's no accident that he invoked a gambling metaphor: "Williams said the Gros Morne route would probably be the cheaper and shorter route, but he said it could be taken off the table if Ottawa would commit to help fund the project." He may be no longer threatening to haul down the Canadian flag, but he's not above environmental blackmail.

Which brings us back to piece. Williams' use of the word may be inexact, but it appears to be closest to [11], i.e., "a nice piece of acting." In this phase of the piece negotiations, the question is whether Williams' threat against Gros Morne is serious. The plan to run hydro towers across a UNESO World Heritage Site may sound crazy, but that's the point. In much the same way as Nixon wanted the North Vietnamese to think he was crazy enough to use nuclear weapons, Williams wants the federal government to think that he's nutty enough to ruin a national park. In much the same way as Nixon became obsessed with "winning" the Vietnam War, Williams is obsessed with the great Hydro war.

As I said last spring, the road to Newfoundland nationalism runs straight through Churchill Falls. To quote its namesake, "Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning." Nixon began his experiment in madman theory in 1969, six years before the Vietnam War finally ended.

How not to be an Opposition critic

How not to be an Opposition critic, from the CBC:
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/newfoundland-labrador/story/2009/07/09/gros-opposition-709.html

Liberal critic Kelvin Parsons said the Gros Morne hydro corridor is a bad first option, saying he thought it was another case of the premier "shooting from the lip."

However, Parsons said he could possibly support the plan under certain circumstances.

"Right now we have a UNESCO site there. There should be no transmission line through there unless it is absolutely necessary to go through there. And we don't know that at this point," he said.

Why on earth would Parsons open the door, even a crack, to the possibility of supporting such an utterly stupid idea? It's not a "bad first option," it's bad. Period.

What could the Liberals possibly gain by giving Williams an inch so he can take a mile? It doesn't take a genius to figure out how political expediency can be skewed to appear as absolute necessity, if the power line lunacy continues. What we don't know at this point is how reckless the Williams government will be, not whether the power lines will be absolutely necessary.

If there is any issue on which the Opposition should take an unequivocal stand, it's this one. The Liberals never seem to miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. (Yes, I know it's an Abba Eban quote).

Now is the time for them to put as much distance as possible between themselves and Danny Williams. I'd trade the "shooting from the lip" quip any day for an unqualified rejection of Williams' (or is it NALCO's?) Gros Morne power line propaganda.

Transmission Talk in Quebec

With local coverage of NALCO in a temporary lull, it's worth taking a look at what's being said in the Quebec media.

According to an opinion piece by Gilles Boivin in Le Soleil, the lack of trust between NL and Quebec is inhibiting negotiation of a broader agreement for developing and transmitting power from the proposed Lower Churchill project: http://www.cyberpresse.ca/le-soleil/opinions/editoriaux/200904/09/01-845353-le-temps-ou-jamais.php

Unless I'm missing an ironic or saractic tone, Boivin seems to take the so-called Anglo-Saxon route seriously. He appears to believe that the technological challenges can be overcome and that NL has enough petrodollars to move forward.

Here's the google translation:
"Time or never
Gilles Boivin Le Soleil
(Québec)
We already knew that Quebec and Newfoundland did not speak the same language. Since the announcement of an agreement for the transport of electricity in Newfoundland on the Quebecois, it is reasonable to ask if they speak the same things.

At first glance, there would be any place to celebrate the beginning of collaboration between two provinces with hydro litigation will rebound to rebound in recent decades. But reading is different in the two protagonists songeur leaves. The premier of Newfoundland, Danny Williams, saw its first breakthrough into the U.S. market. The Quebec Minister of Natural Resources, Claude Béchard sees rather a recognition of the need for agreement with Quebec for the transport of electricity to this lucrative market.

The least we can say is that trust is a tragically absent from negotiations between the two provinces. It includes an agreement to work jointly harness the rivers of Lower Churchill has been short-lived, some years ago. Watching things and each of its end of the telescope, we lose sight of the goal.

At the point where now Newfoundland (and Ottawa!) Dream of a highway east-west power in Canada with transit to the United States. Québec is hard as iron to be within its territory, the sole owner and project manager for the highway ... . pay. No way to let Ottawa "put your nose in the construction of transmission lines" among us, slice, with reason, Premier Jean Charest.

And for good reason! Behind this apparently theoretical debate, if not constitutional, is looming in effect the sale of green power on the lucrative markets as Ontario and American. Faced with billions of dollars at stake, early agreement announced earlier this week does not compute. Just 40 to $ 80 million for Newfoundland and twenty million dollars for Hydro-Quebec. But it could still lay the groundwork for a broader agreement between the two provinces.

An exciting prospect for Ontario, which relies on the energy of a future development of mega terreneuvien Lower Churchill to get rid of its coal. And Newfoundland also has need of a market for this ambitious project. At the point where she is studying the feasibility of a submarine link to bypass the province and its precious megawatts sell directly to the U.S. market.

But petrodollars helping the island province will probably be the means to do so. Especially since technically it has already been done in Europe, between Sweden and the Netherlands. Moreover, one of the companies associated with the Lower Churchill, the Norwegian Statnett, has expertise in this area.

This comes on the table for Quebec when it comes to run the La Romaine project, a hydroelectric plant with a capacity of 1550 megawatts. These are more than 2800 MW project that the Lower Churchill put on the market almost simultaneously. And Newfoundland has already indicated it does not remove the nose on a "support" a few billion federal dollars.

To the chagrin of Quebec alone has developed and continues to do so, its hydropower. Before ending up before the fact, Quebec and Hydro-Quebec would certainly benefit to undertake serious negotiations with neighboring Newfoundland. Unless it is already too late and that he refuses ... Face it, the speaker of Quebec is no longer small and powerless poor province that has signed in the late 60s, a way that has benefited 19 times less than Hydro-Québec."

Pick Your Partner

For all the prattle about going it alone and self-reliance, the 2 April press release makes it clear that Dangovt is not talking about developing Hydro power all by itself.

In fact, Dangovt is highlighting its new partnership. This partnership is not with Ottawa, Quebec, or any other province or state but, rather, a corporation: Emera.

The press release makes it clear that this deal is being touted as the beginning of a longer-term business relationship. For all the rhetoric about a "historic and momentous occasion for the people of our province," it was framed in terms of two businesses (both of which operate monopolies) forming a strategic partnership.

To make sure that this special relationship was lost on no one, Emera was cut a slice of the publicity pie. “This is an exciting opportunity for both Nalcor and Emera Energy,” said Wayne O'Connor Chief Operating Officer of Emera Energy. “We are proud to play a part and look forward to working together to bring this valuable resource to markets across northeast North America.”

“At the present time, we are working with Emera Energy to have our power get to these markets,” said Premier Williams. “In other words, we have concluded a sale agreement with them so that with their considerable expertise in the industry, this power, originating from our province may be sold into markets. Obviously, this is something entirely new for us as a province and so we retained the best expertise possible in these early days. Our goal is to eventually develop the expertise at Nalcor so that we can act as seller into final markets. We understand from Emera that power from Labrador today is being sold directly into the United States; destination – New York. Newfoundland and Labrador is taking a bite out of the big apple.” See http://www.releases.gov.nl.ca/releases/2009/exec/0402n06.htm

To certify that this is, in fact, an authentic Dangovt proclamation, it contains a nonsensical code sentence: "Having assessed all options, Nalcor Energy determined the most strategic and valuable decision moving forward is this arrangement as opposed to entering another power purchase agreement with Quebec at this time." When you see such Danspeak, you know that you're dealing with an important Dannouncement.

Now that we've been told that Emera is going to be such a bold part of such a historic arrangement, it might be helpful to know a thing or two about this company and its operations in the Maritimes: http://www.emera.com/en/home/default.aspx

With Emera comes a Maritimes connection that has been overlooked in NL, but not in NS. The announcement has already fueled speculation about the role NS will play in the hypothetical Labrador-Newfoundland-Maritimes transmission line. With Graham already talking tough about the prospect of wheeling power through NB, speculation has turned to how NS faces a "squeeze play": http://thechronicleherald.ca/Business/1114709.html

While NL was in the frenzy of its initial Hydro spin, trash talk was already breaking out in the NS media, with one Chronicle Herald story headlined, "Premier zaps N.B.’s Graham: If you don’t want to be part of the Churchill power project, then you can be bypassed, N.B. premier told." At least the reporters managed to point out that no decision has been made about the hypothetical transmission lines, and the projected cost of the hypothetical project could top $9 billion: http://thechronicleherald.ca/Business/1114763.html

In Nova Scotia, Emera is known for providing, via Nova Scotia Power, inferior service for inflated prices. Here's a sampling from CBC's coverage:
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/nova-scotia/story/2009/02/10/ns-power-bennett.html
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/novascotia/story/2007/04/03/macdonald-nsp.html
http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2008/11/05/nsp-rate-increase.html
http://www.cbc.ca/news/story/2007/08/28/survey-utilities.html

As any Nova Scotian can tell you, at length, mixing a public monopoly with private business can give you the worst of both worlds. NALCO loves to present itself as a savy business, but nothing -- repeat, nothing -- will happen with the Lower Churchill without gobs and gobs of taxpayers' money.

And nothing will happen until the music stops in the pick-your-partner Hydro dance. Perhaps that's the point.

Danny Chavez Reconsidered

When Danny Williams gets compared to Hugo Chávez, the assumption is that this means that Williams' political apoplexy prevents him from cutting deals with enemies.

The assumption is that this occlusion (rooted in some combination of grandiosity and sociopathy) draws on a genuine ideology that subordinates commerce to politics.

This assumption is wrong. If Danny Williams is, in fact, anything like Chávez, the results may surprise some observers.

For all Chávez's socialist rhetoric, Venezuela continues to enjoy a close economic relationship with the United States. The US is still one of Venezuela's most important trading partners; even during the nadir of the Bush presidency, trade between the two countries actually increased. The US is Venezuela's largest oil customer and a major foreign investor.

James Surowiecki raises some interesting parallels. He writes, "Chávez has been the beneficiary of excellent timing: oil prices have quintupled since he took over, allowing him to hand out billions of dollars to the poor. But he has done little to diversify the nation’s industrial base and lessen the economy’s dependence on oil, while his few tepid ventures into state ownership or coöperatives will have no meaningful economic impact. The result is that the ties between the U.S. and Venezuela have actually tightened."

Surowiecki's short article is worth a full reading, especially the last paragraph. Try substituting anti-Canadianism for anti-Americanism: http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2007/01/08/070108ta_talk_surowiecki

As the Hydro spin cycle continues, it's worth keeping in mind that NL faces essentially the same constraints as it did three years ago. For a sense of perspective, see this 2006 piece in Maclean's:
http://www.macleans.ca/canada/national/article.jsp?content=20060731_130820_130820

One quotation in particular jumps out: "although the science fiction of a marine route that bypasses Quebec and flows energy from Labrador to, say, Boston, would have a price tag worthy of NASA."

Ottawa may be a planet away from this story right now, but sooner or later the federal government will play an important role in the Hydro drama. Whether it acts as the Deus ex machina is anyone's guess, but the emergence of a modus vivendi between Ottawa and St. John's remains a necessary condition for any major development of Churchill Falls.

It's no accident that the Hydro story remains enmeshed in the rhetoric of Newfoundland nationalism; for DW, the separatist threat remains a useful political tool. But while it's still useful in provincial politics, federal politics is an entirely different matter: 2009 is not 2004.

Here's a flashback to 2004, courtesy of Bond Papers: "Public optimism was shattered as Williams stormed from the meeting, flew back to St. John's and scheduled a media briefing for December 22. He announced there was no Christmas present from Paul Martin. Williams' talked of getting a slap in the face.Then he ordered Canadian flags to be taken from every provincial building. "Why would we fly their flag and pretend everything is rosy?" he told reporters at Confederation Building." [my emphasis]. See http://bondpapers.blogspot.com/2005/07/getting-deal-danny-williams-and.html

So here's a question: is DW more captive to his populist nationalism than Chávez is to his populist socialism?



For further reading on Chávez, see: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/06/23/080623fa_fact_anderson

Hydro Spin (updated)

In just a couple of days, the Hydro story has gone through several early spin cycles. In the Telegram's initial story, DW was focused on gloating about his great achievement. "Newfoundland and Labrador is now taking a bite out of the Big Apple," Williams said.

The Lower Churchill was in the back seat, with the Tely story offering a follow-up statement: "He also said the agreement may also put the province in a better position to develop the Lower Churchill." See http://thetelegram.com/index.cfm?sid=238932&sc=79

By contrast, by the time of the CBC's story, the focus had shifted: "Power transfer through Quebec good for Lower Churchill 'leverage': Williams." According to the CBC: "Williams said the deal — which allows Newfoundland and Labrador to export as much as 250 megawatts of power in the summer months, when domestic demand drops but U.S. demand is surging — sets up the Lower Churchill megaproject, which is still in the planning stages." See http://www.cbc.ca/canada/newfoundland-labrador/story/2009/04/03/williams-lower-churchill.html

The difference between the two stories may be the result of different reporters' interpretations or different information they obtained. For good measure, the CBC story ends with the Lower Churchill, too: "The Lower Churchill is far from a certainty. The province will require federal government involvement for structuring the financing, and it requires regulatory approval."

The Tely's story dealt with the issue via an interview with Danny Dumaresque. "He told The Telegram there is 'absolutely nothing new' in this agreement. 'It doesn't bring us one inch closer to a Lower Churchill project because it doesn't give us the essential ingredient which is the right to build a transmission line across Quebec, he said. Dumaresque also said there's no space on Quebec's grid to move the projected 3,000 megawatts from the Lower Churchill."

While Geoff Meeker has analyzed the spins taking place in the media coverage, Bond Papers has reported developments in the availability of government information. Whereas the media coverage has been highly fluid and, in some cases, erratic, the provincial state has been busy redacting pubicly available material:
http://thetelegram.com/index.cfm?sid=239030&sc=88
http://bondpapers.blogspot.com/2009/04/wheeling-deal.html

We'll see what the Tely has to say today, but three unanswered questions come to mind:

1) Where is the Romaine River project in all this? Even in normal times, the amount of available capital for massive hydro projects is finite; during a global recession, access to capital is significantly constricted. It's hard to imagine how the Romaine and Lower Churchill projects can be separated: the development of one will surely affect the other.

2) Where is the federal government in all this? No doubt DW wants this story to unfold in a provincial vacuum -- Ottawa, what Ottawa? -- with the theme of self-reliance eclipsing any disucssion of what role the Harper regime is willing to play in raising capital or supporting regulatory approval.

3) How do the alternate transmission routes fit into this? If DW is now emphasizing how he has leveraged a deal to show the viability of transmitting future Lower Churchill power to the bitten Big Apple, does this mean that the NALCO-Gros Morne transmission line is a red herring?

It looks like there will be quite a few red herrings swimming around this story, so it's useful to keep in mind the etymology of red herring, which originally referred to smoked herring dragged across the trail of the fox (Hydro) to throw the hounds (public) off the scent:http://www.fallacyfiles.org/redherrf.html


Power Play Update:
Check out this interview with DW:
http://watch.ctv.ca/news/power-play/thursday-april-2#clip157120

As others have already reported, DW is clear that there is no deal with Quebec. What's less clear is how the "all options" on the table approach is going to work if actual construction ever starts on the transmission lines.

What's abundantly clear is that it remains metaphysically impossible to discuss Churchill Falls (Upper or Lower) without dragging in the entire kitchen sink of nationalist blather, from über-optimism to Harper to separatism and, curiously, back to George Baker. DW tries to declare that he's over Harper, who is now an official untermensch (DW says, with a straight face, that he doesn't have time for enemies), and he calls Curious George a great guy who doesn't really mean what he says (now how would be know that?).

As I've said before, the road to Newfoundland nationalism runs straight through Churchill Falls. To quote its namesake, "Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."

The Non-Story Story, II

It looks like the non-story Romaine story may have traction after all, with the Telegram weighing in this morning:
http://www.thetelegram.com/index.cfm?sid=221918&sc=80

A sensible enough editorial, but what on earth possessed them to give legitimacy to Wingnut Nation by saying, "One Internet commentator has already sent a letter to Premier Danny Williams likening the non-recognition of the established boundary as "an overt act of aggression" and even "an act of war." I'm sure said internet commentator is mighty pleased with the free press.

The local media have been slow to wake up to the fact that facts matter less than politics and popular memory when it comes to nationalisms and borders.

The Quebec media certainly aren't letting go of this. In today's le Soleil, Michel Corbeil's column weighs in on the border question and, unlike the Tely, links it to the development of the Lower Churchill:

"Des sources québécoises soutiennent que Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador tente de faire obstacle à La Romaine pour préserver les minces chances de lancer son propre projet, la construction d'installations sur le Bas-Churchill, au Labrador."

http://www.cyberpresse.ca/le-soleil/affaires/actualite-economique/200902/12/01-826840-ultime-effort-de-terre-neuve-pour-bloquer-la-romaine.php

Update:

There is a wire report from the Assembly of the First Nations of Quebec and Labrador stating that the entire Romaine project lies on Innu territory:
http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/February2009/12/c8291.html


Back to the Future Update:

This Yakabuski article in the Glib certainly shows how little has changed in three years:

http://www.sqwalk.com/blog2006/000864.html

"[T]he Hydro Idol finale might not be pretty to watch. Although it will undoubtedly spawn entertaining conspiracy theories on Newfoundland talk shows."

The end might not be here, but the conspiracy theories are already out in full force.

The Non-Story Story

It looks like the Glib's original article may have got the story wrong and the Romaine question may end up generating no more local controversy than a caesar salad. But the tsunami of 428 comments on the Glib's site, which is now closed to further commentary (would have been interesting to see how far the discussion would have gone), shows that the Labrador boundary question stirred up a hornets nest of nationalism: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090211.wrivers11/CommentStory/National/home

However, the Glib's follow-up story today ends with this assertion, which surely is worthy of local scrutiny: "But if Newfoundland can stall the Romaine project, maybe, just maybe, Mr. Williams' lower Churchill dream stands a fighting chance. A slim one, but one more than none."
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090211.wyakabuski0212/BNStory/energy/home

The lack of commentary in the local media, including the bloggosphere, is curious. Either Seguin and Yakabuski both got the story wrong and sensationalized a rather quiet issue, or there is something here that will have political traction, sooner or later. If it's the former rather than the latter, one would expect that such misleading reporting would attract analysis.

Meanwhile, it's certainly not escaping attention in Quebec:
http://www.cyberpresse.ca/actualites/quebec-canada/national/200902/11/01-826178-la-romaine-terre-neuve-conteste-le-droit-dhydro-quebec.php

If it's such a dead issue, then why did Seguin get to lead the story with "Power play pits Quebec against Newfoundland?" Jason Churchill, who has done research on Churchill Falls (I guess surnames do influence what we do), wrote to correct "misinformation" but called the piece "otherwise excellent":
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20090212.COLETTS12-9/TPStory/TPComment/Atlantic/

The non-story story may not have got the people to the barricades, but it got the wingnuts to their laptops. And I still believe that the road to Newfoundland nationalism will continue to run through Labrador.

While the media continues to focus, almost to the point of obsession, on the departure of Campbell, it doesn't seem to realize that Dangovt couldn't care less about the MUN file and, supported by its own Danpolling, knows that Prezgate is not as serious a threat as the St. John's media would like it to be.

In the meantime, it looks like the non-story story of Romaine will get passed over. This may turn out to be the boundary battle that never happened, but I bet you a caesar salad that we haven't heard the last of the border question.