What a wonderful world we live in!

As we move into this new year of 2023, we need to reflect on what is going on around us; not much to rejoice about. Let’s start with the war raging in Europe and the endless loss of lives there. It seems to be escalating instead of winding down, after a whole year of fighting. For the moment, it does not affect us directly, so we don’t seem to be taking it very hard here in Canada. For the sake of our children and grandchildren, I do hope that cooler heads will prevail and end this nonsense, so close to devastating the start of this brand new century. Another half–laughable, half-serious happening in the world, involves the quite old-fashioned balloons, which rose to worldwide attention, making busy work for politicians, taking sides and pointing fingers. Let’s take a closer look at this new affair, since our esteemed Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, finds himself in the balloon business as well, if not the chief ballooner. It started in the United States, where a balloon that originated in China, flew over US national territory, creating havoc at the highest political level. On their end, there is one thing the White House would like you to know about the unidentified flying objects shot down over the U.S. and Canada this past weekend: aliens probably didn’t send them. “There is no, again, no indication of aliens or extra-terrestrial activity with these recent takedowns,” US press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre emphatically told a briefing this week. The balloons seem to have created a new subject for eager politicians, possibly to distract them from more serious and more stringent issues such as the welfare of their own citizens. Indeed, it is unclear how NORAD, the joint US - Canada air defence system, set up in 1958 to intercept hypothetical Soviet attacks via the Arctic, did not react to the balloons and did not order their destruction. The balloons seem to have defeated the costly system set up to identified enemy ballistic missiles. The balloon saga started sometime on or before Jan. 31, when Canadian fighter jets began tracking a suspicious Chinese spy or non-spy balloon over the Rocky Mountains. President Joe Biden himself becoming a chief ballooner said it was too dangerous to shoot down over land, for fear of killing or injuring someone on the ground, so the US waited until it drifted off the South Carolina coast to fell it with a missile ordered by the President. (The second missile succeeded). However, The US and Canada have not explained yet why NORAD didn’t shoot the balloon down before it reached populated areas. Was it a deliberate decision in order to study the object, or did they simply fail to detect it until it was too late. Then last week, US fighter jets shot down three more unidentified objects, presumably more balloons, over the Arctic Ocean off the coast of Alaska, the central Yukon wilderness and the waters of Lake Huron. Canadian warplanes were also involved in the pursuit of the second object, with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau authorizing the shoot-down. Balloons eh…. Both governments say they don’t know what these last three objects were or who sent them. By these admissions, it seems that these kinds of balloons have been circulating over Canada and the US for a long time without detection. In a briefing last week, NORAD commander General Glen VanHerck said that the system’s radars are usually set to filter out slow-moving objects, presumably to focus on more obvious potential threats, such as planes or missiles. After the detection of the Chinese balloon, NORAD readjusted the radars and started picking up the objects (other balloons) President Biden and PM Trudeau subsequently ordered taken down. “We’ve been able to get a better categorization of radar tracks now. And that’s why I think you’re seeing these overall. Plus, there’s a heightened alert to look for this information,” General VanHerck told reporters. So, the Victorian era balloons defeated a multibillion dollar defence system! To add to the circus people started to speculate about aliens, UFOs and ETs. Asked about this, General VanHerck made the mistake of not answering the question directly. “I haven’t ruled out anything,” he replied. After the internet exploded with variations of “high-ranking general won’t rule out aliens” posts, the White House decided to act proactively and pour cold water on the speculation. At the start of the White House briefing, Ms. Jean-Pierre the US President’s spokesperson; repeatedly made it clear in her way, that there is nothing to suggest that extra-terrestrials sent craft across the galaxy only to see them felled by a species that has never travelled farther than the moon. Returning our attention to our national turf, we see things happening in Toronto the good that are from an outside world. Just re-elected Mayor John Tory suddenly said that he would resign over an intimate extramarital affair with a young staffer in his office. However, he has not resigned officially, and his office has declared that his departure won’t be immediate. “Mayor John Tory will be attending the upcoming budget meeting to ensure the 2023 City of Toronto operating and capital budgets are finalized. The budget makes key investments in housing, transit, and community safety and the Mayor will be working to ensure it is approved,” said a written statement from Taylor Deasley, Tory’s press secretary and issues manager. In the mean time, the crimes on innocent people are skyrocketing in downtown Toronto. What next? Should we be laughing or crying?