Canada's Alert Ready System Needs Improvement

This past weekend in Ontario, we had an Amber Alert issued. And although the child was found safe and sound, there are some things that need major improvements.

Last year, Canada's "Alert Ready" system was rolled out, this is similar to the "Emergency Broadcast System" that has been in the United States for many decades now. This system uses traditional radio and television signals to inform people of important events such as severe weather, terrorist threats and Amber Alerts just to name a few.

Now, the Amber Alert system has been in place for quite a while now and the new alert ready system is another way to get the message out there. Prior to now, it would be up to the individual radio and TV stations to broadcast this information. This new alert ready system is an attempt to get information out faster and more efficiently by having important information broadcast on all media outlets at the exact same time. These alerts will interrupt the broadcast that you are watching or listening to. Some people have complained about this. That's not what this article is about. This article is about getting information out EFFECTIVELY.

On Sunday night, we had an Amber Alert issued for a missing child here in Ontario. Here is what the alert looked like on news websites and other social media:

THIS IS AN "AMBER ALERT" ACTIVATION MESSAGE!

Police: Toronto Police Service

Child : 3 month old baby boy, short dark hair,

Abductor: Male white, 20-25 years old. Short blond hair, 5 foot 11 inches, medium build

Vehicle: Tan colored 4 Door 1997 Toyota Camry, Ontario # BWRC 161

Location last observed: Northbound Highway #27 at Albion Road

If observed call 911

Looks pretty good right? Yes it does. Unfortunately, trying to get this information out via Broadcasts was a complete disaster. Here is the audio version as this alert sounded if you heard it on TV or radio:

 
So many things wrong here. What did the guy say? Of course it wasn't a real guy, it was obviously some text to speech system. And as you can hear, the numbers weren't translated correctly. The 1997 model year was transcribed to "one thousand, nine hundred ninety seven". And the best part, if you see this vehicle, call "September 1st, 2001". On top of that, this alert aired only ONCE. Imagine driving in your car and hearing this on the radio. Before you can really grasp what is going on, the alert is over and is never repeated. I have other beefs with the way this was all handled, I covered it this week on my podcast.

This system was in development for a few years before it rolled out. I have a hard time believing that somewhere along the way, someone didn't think to put some test text into the system to hear how it sounded.

I really hope improvements can be made to this system. Even though this was mandated by the government, it's still good to have as many venues as possible to get vital information out there. Perhaps the private sector could have pulled this off more efficiently.

Libertarianism 101

This week's podcast episode was titled "Libertarianism 101". I wanted to clarify some basic libertarian positions that I passively make reference to that may confuse some people. We covered 4 areas... Click HERE to listen to the full 30 minute episode.

Here is a summary:

Government Regulation

Typical Thought: We need government regulation to clamp down on big business. Without government regulation, the consumers will be abused, prices will be sky high and we'd be drinking orange juice laced with bleach.

If you really think about it, government regulations are kind of redundant. In a free and open marketplace, Businesses will take it among themselves to make sure products are safe and offered at a competitive price. Otherwise, they'd be out of business.

What about drugs? Many think that the FDA and Health Canada need to keep unproven drugs off the market. But no one thinks of it the other way. What about people who die while waiting for drugs to be approved? There is tremendous evidence to suggest government has killed more people withholding drugs from the market than it ever has releasing a drug too early.

Conclusion: Government regulation often has the opposite effect to what was originally intended. And any well meaning company would take it among themselves to make sure standards are met. Otherwise... you'd be out of business.

Monopoly

Typical Thought: We need government regulation to oversee big business... otherwise Wal-Mart would run everything.

We hear about monopolies all the time but in reality, it have never occurred in the history of north America. In fact, the only REAL monopolies occur with government ie. Alcohol sales, Healthcare, Heating and Hydro. All competition is outlawed in these areas... THAT is a true monopoly.

Conclusion: The word "Monopoly" is over used, and the only REAL monopolies in society occur within government.

 Capitalism

Typical Thought: Capitalism is bad. Only government oversight can prevent big business from abusing their power.

People THINK we live in a capitalist country... but we don't. The fact is, most government policy favours big business over little business. Business and government work very closely together. All you have to do is look at the biggest donors to the main political parties to know what's really going on.

Conclusion: We don't actually live in a country that practices Capitalism. What we THINK is capitalism, is actually crony capitalism brought on by bad government policy.

Government Spending

Typical Thought: Government is essential to keep the economy moving, invest in our future and create jobs to ensure the economy stays strong.

Because government doesn't have any of it's own money. By default, every dollar that government spends, is a dollar NOT spent some place else. Some people disagree with this claiming that the "Multiplier Effect" has a positive effect on the economy. However, it is debatable whether or not the multiplier effect actually exists.

Conclusion: Government doesn't actually create jobs. The best it can do is move a job from one location to another.

Oh, How The Wind Blows

Remember that really windy day we had last week (November 24th)? What a great day that must have been for wind energy huh? Yeah, about that... it wasn't.

Last Monday was one of the windiest days in recent memory and oh boy were Ontario's wind turbines moving. The problem was, they were producing way more power than was needed. This over excess of power ended up costing Ontario taxpayers $10 Million for just that one day.

According to Wind Concerns Ontario, the province generated over 45,000 megawatt hours of electricity that day. Because we didn't need that electricity, we ended up exporting 20,000 of that it to Quebec, Michigan and New York state. But we sold it off at a LOSS, just over $11 per megawatt hour. To put that in perspective, all that wind produced power is worth, $135/MWh... that's a boatload of money lost.

The problem with wind power is the wind blows mainly at night, but a majority of energy demand is during the day. So, power is being produced at a time when it's not needed. Because of this, power is sold off to neighbouring provinces or even nearby american states at bargain bin prices. To make up for this loss, prices during the day are artificially high. So, we are paying extra high electricity prices during the day, to make up for the power we're not using at night.

Once power is on the grid, it has to go somewhere. As of now, it's very difficult to store power for use later. The only method I'm aware of involves large tanks of compressed air underground. This of course is not cheap and sounds very unsafe. Talk about a disaster waiting to happen.

The wind is certainly blowing with Green energy. A report in the Globe and Mail this week suggested that Green energy jobs have eclipsed jobs in the oil industry. Do you know one person working in the green energy industry?... I don't. It's easy to proclaim something a success when it's subsidized at the expense of everyone else. The green energy industry only exists because of millions in government bailouts handed out every year.

The REAL Reason Behind The Light Bulb Ban

I really should put Reason Magazine on my browser bookmarks. I almost missed this article about the controversial Light bulb ban.

On January 1st, the Canadian and US governments put into place a ban on 75 and 100 watt traditional light bulbs (the 40 and 60 watt bulbs will be phased out at the end of this year). At first it looked like this was a push by environmental groups to ban traditional light bulbs which were less energy efficient. But now, the secret is out. This light bulb ban has nothing to do with Environmentalism. It was crony Capitalism.

We are now finding out that some of the biggest light bulb manufactures like Philips, Sylvania and General Electric lobbied the government for this. In particular, Phillips paid environmental groups (like the national resources defence council) to pressure the government into banning traditional light bulbs.

Now, why would Philips, Sylvania and GE be in favour of a Light Bulb ban? Because traditional light bulbs don’t have very big profit margins. The Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFL’s) are more expensive and most of the time, are made in china. They can make a bigger profit off the CFL’s.

Libertarians are pro business. There is nothing wrong with starting a business, becoming successful and maybe opening up a bunch of locations.  However, when these companies become so large that they have an influence over government policy, that’s when it becomes a problem. Contrary to popular belief, large companies often lobby the government to change regulations to give them an advantage. Regulations that their competitors won’t be able to keep up with or will prevent a new competitor from even starting up in the first place. This is not capitalism, this is crony capitalism. In the case of this bulb ban, Philips and GE were worried about an upstart competitor getting a huge contract with Wal-mart.

This was not about saving energy, saving the planet or sensible environmental policy winning out. Philips and GE knew that people wouldn’t buy the more expensive bulbs so they successfully got them banned. The CFL’s aren’t really that environmentally friendly either. It’s too bad we aren’t free to buy the light bulbs that we want. One of my basic fundamental beliefs is: You should be able to buy whatever you want from whoever wants to sell it to you. Now excuse me… I have to update my browser bookmarks.