The Oppenheimer Report - 6/28/10

6/23/10 - Headed back from Buffalo to Toronto, I must have been driving on the QEW when “big” earthquake struck, and I missed it! While the epicenter was near Ottawa, people felt it as far away as Toronto. Shauna said that she felt it in Katrine. Maybe ten years ago I felt a slight tremor from our high rise apartment, and I understand that there are some major fault lines running through this area. While this quake was a mere 5 on the Richter Scale,  the rarity of earthquakes in this area made it a notable event. I wonder what will happen to our 51 storey apartment building if a big one hits. Later on today, up in Midland Ontario (not too far from Jasper Bark Lodge), an F-2 tornado touched down and did some major damage. The G-8 Summit started up in Huntsville last Thursday, so all those would-be terrorists hiding out in the woods might have had a bit of a windy night. Don’t mess with Canada you fundamentalist jackals, you can’t handle our weather. The reason Mahmoud can’t find his rocket launcher is because it’s now in a cow pasture in Uxbridge.



6/25/10 - The reason I came back from Buffalo sooner than I might have chosen to is that today, the G-20 summit began in Toronto, and I knew I’d have trouble getting into the city  if I waited. There are police and security people everywhere, and there are protesters all over the place hoping to make their concerns known to the presumably well protected leaders. I hope they’re well-protected , because some of these protests are about the gigantic price  the Canadian taxpayer will pay for this little shindig ... about $1 Billion. Today, I rode my bicycle over to the east end to drop off some old clothes at Goodwill, and I rode right through the beginning of a big protest march. There was some guy up on his soap box screaming some anarchist nonsense, and there were phalanxes of policemen patrolling both sides of the street. As I rode further up the street there were bus  filled with standby police parked and waiting. One bus came all the way from Cape Breton Island. Are we expecting trouble?



Saturday 6/26/10 - Now I understand why there was such a huge police presence; today the protest got ugly. While the majority of the protesters were well-mannered and peaceful, there were a group of perhaps 100-150 troublemakers - the press called them anarchists, but  I think that does a disservice to anarchists - who broke store windows, pillaged, and lit several police cars on fire. It was strange to follow the local live coverage on T.V., then to look out of our apartment window and see the smoke from the burning cars. I understand these troublemakers travel from summit to summit and are well known to law enforcement agencies. I think it’s pretty stupid to light a police car on fire when you know a hundred people, including the media, are filming it. Under the circumstances, I think the police showed remarkable restraint. People were throwing bricks and rocks at them and generally, they did not seem to overreact. If something like that had happened in Buffalo, the cops would have beaten the violators to within an inch of their lives. Sunday I rollerbladed down to where the violence had occurred the day before and there were a lot of boarded up buildings.  Hope the summit was worth the price.


Final notes ... U.S. Senator Robert Byrd dies at 92 ...  Tropical Storm /Hurricane Alex may threaten the oil spill cleanup efforts in the Gulf. 70 days in, with all that oil floating around in the Gulf, think about the mess a hurricane would cause. In the World Cup, The U.S. lost to Ghana dashing their playoff hopes. Germany defeated England, and Argentina beat Mexico to advance to the next round. I’m headed back up north tomorrow, now that the dust has settled.


Earthquakes, tornadoes, riots, torrential rainfall and floods … do you think Mother Nature is making some kind of statement about the sorry state of our world? I suppose those G-20 leaders paid about as much attention to her as they did to “Jews against Zionism” protesters . Just another week in paradise!


Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c 2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 6/21/10

Dad at the beach house - August, 2002

I’m down in Buffalo for a few days to visit my mom, pay some bills, and take one glorious lap around Grand Island on my friend’s 27’ Magnum. I love that boat. When I opened up the Buffalo News last Friday morning, there, obscured by the bold print headlines about BP CEO Tim Hayword’s tongue lashing in Congress (talk about your political grandstanding), was an article about a proposed wind farm they’re talking about building in Western New York. The proposed farm would be situated 2 miles out into windy Lake Erie somewhere south of Buffalo near Hamburg, N.Y., and would be capable of producing enough electricity to power 130,000 homes. Sounds like a “no brainer,” right? Well here’s a new twist to the “not-in-my-backyard” argument: digging the foundations for these windmills will likely stir up the toxic waste that has for years been settling on the lake floor in the area. The proposed location is not far south of the sites of the former Bethlehem Steel plant and a few other dirty industries that used to dump their toxic waste into the pristine waters of Lake Erie. Now, residents of the waterfront properties south of Buffalo aren’t even supposed to relocate large rocks on the shoreline for fear of stirring up the dreaded waste; it could threaten the fish population. It stands to reason that pouring foundations for over one hundred and fifty giant windmills might stir some of that muck up as well. I also read that the power generated by these windmills will be three or four times as expensive as the power now generated by Niagara Mohawk. I’m not exactly sure why that is, perhaps because it costs a lot to build them. Alternative energy always seems to be ridiculously expensive; why is that? Still, you’ve got to love renewable energy. Maybe someday we’ll all have little wind generating plants of our own. Just like the Dutch.



In the meantime, until someone figures out how to make renewable energy a viable, large scale solution to our voracious electrical demand, nuclear power seems like a reasonable compromise to me. Nobody wants to see another Chernobyl disaster, but reactor technology and safety have come a long way since then, and there is no question that we need to do something satisfy our growing demand for electricity. Have you ever gone without it for a week? It’s darned inconvenient. In our apartment building we can't flush our toilets without electricity. We’ve now seen what one deep water drilling rig disaster can do to the environment, and this should be a bit of a shot in the arm to all the alternative energy advocates. The problem with the myth that electric cars will save the planet is that electricity doesn’t grow on trees. It is so often generated by burning fossil fuels and creating greenhouse gases. Yes, spent fuel rods from a nuclear power plant have a shelf life which probably exceeds the existence of mankind, and yes, radiation leaks are really dangerous. But lots of countries virtually rely on nuclear energy now, and it is generally a cleaner solution to burning fossil fuels. I think it’s worth the risk. Besides, we now have an oil slick the size of the Louisiana Purchase coming ashore on the Gulf coast, so fossil fuels aren’t exactly without environmental consequences either. Do we destroy the entire marine ecosystem of the Gulf coast (oops, too late, we already did) or do we irradiate twenty square hectares of Nebraska that nobody cares about? Decisions, decisions! As for the argument that nuclear power plants are easy targets for terrorist attacks, yes, I suppose they are. By the way, so are chemical plants, of which there are plenty in the U.S., and let’s not rule out the 40,000 or so offshore oil rigs presently in operation. Post 9-11, I’m afraid the delusion of national security has been somewhat comprimised.


In sports, Brazil is presently a front runner in the World Cup competition. Portugal is not far behind, and they just walloped N. Korea 7-0 (yippee!). Did any of you else see the questionable call that cost the U.S. a come-from-behind win against Slovenia last week? It stinks when the difference between winning and tying a match is determined by a referee who probably made a critical error in judgment. If anything, I think the American player was interfered with, not the other way around. I have two words for those refs: instant replay. There have been a lot of upsets so far; New Zealand tied former World Cup champions Italy yesterday, and that was a big upset. In golf, Northern Irishman Graeme McDowell won the U.S. Open yesterday at Pebble Beach, and I actually watched about half the round. I think I secretly took pleasure watching Tiger Woods hook a few into the rough. Karma’s a bitch. I still say watching golf is a little like watching the grass grow, but that was what Mom and the nurse were watching (for some inexplicable reason), so that‘s what we watched. A belated Happy Father’s Day to all my readers who are dads.





Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 6/14/10

The G8 Summit is about to take place near Huntsville, Ontario, which is about 20 miles from our house in Katrine. While the event has prompted a major facelift for the town, including some improvements to infrastructure, the jury is still out as to whether or not it will be good for the town’s economy. Many of the businesses with which I deal in Huntsville are heading for the hills, and the newspapers are filled with stories about secret service and security. I imagine that anyone who goes camping in the Muskokas next week will be in for a rude surprise. Personally, I don’t think one can “get back to nature” while commandos are scampering around in the bush carrying automatic weapons. When the G8 was held in Kananaskis, Alberta back in 2002, I was foolish enough to go grocery shopping in nearby Canmore, and it was a ridiculous spectacle. That sleepy little mountain town was overrun with secret service guys talking into their sleeves, there were fighter jets constantly traversing the sky, and helicopters were everywhere overhead. Let’s just say it was bit of a rocky mountain buzz kill. I was sure someone was going to try to assassinate Dubya during that summit, but no credible threats were ever publicly reported. Shortly after the G8 takes place up here, there is a G20 summit in Downtown Toronto. I read about security for that little get together, and it appears that if I need to travel to or from Buffalo between June 24th to the 26th, I’m S.O.L. It seems that every major highway into Toronto will be all but closed down. All the snipers are presently scrambling for the best high rise roofs.




The FIFA international soccer match is now underway in South Africa, and World Cup fever is upon us. If you’re too busy to watch it on T.V. many internet providers are offering live streaming video of the matches. Who am I watching there on my 2 inch cell phone screen …. is it Ghana or Italy, I can‘t tell? Is that a player or a bird? I ask you, how in heavens name are we supposed to watch a soccer match on a cell phone screen? So far, I’ve watched several matches, including the one between Argentina and Nigeria last Saturday, (1-1). I watched the U.S. tie England (1-1) the other day, and that was considered an upset because, on paper England was the better team. Franky, I don’t understand why soccer isn’t more popular in North America; it’s a great game to watch. For my money it’s ten times more exciting than American football, not to mention the fact that it requires ten times more stamina. Soccer players play two 45 minute periods of almost constant running, there are only 3 substitute players (plus the backup goalie), and they play with very little padding. I realize that there are overpaid, pompous, self-important athletes in all professional sports, including world cup soccer, but I think the Americans have everyone else beat in terms of atrocious athlete behavior. But that’s a (never-ending) rant for another day. I think we Americans thrive on the bad behavior; it gives us something about which to complain.



The Chicago Blackhawks are the new Stanley Cup champions after winning Game Six in overtime IN Philadelphia. Former Buffalonian Patrick Kane (speaking of bad behavior) scored the game winner, and though I was watching, I did not actually see the puck go in the net. That was a good series. I hate a playoff series wherein one team completely dominates. I’ll always remember that the Hawks won that series because my nephew and his wife had a baby boy (Willem) that morning, and they live in Chicago. Everybody’s joking that Willem’s middle name should be Stanley. I think that is a little like naming your child after the place where he or she was conceived. Meet my daughter Schenectady.



Friday was day 53 of the BP oil spew. The big news last week was that BP knew that more oil was spilling out than they admitted; as it turns out about twice as much. All we need to do is take an aerial shot of the Gulf of Mexico to see that. I say stop the finger pointing, there’s plenty of blame to go around. Let’s face it, most North Americans have a pretty big carbon footprint. I’m like Sasquatch. This is a big mess, stop squabbling about how big and figure out how to shut it off and clean it up. Fun facts: over 1 million feet of coastal boom and 430,000 feet of deep water boom have been set. The volume of the spew is now estimated to be up to 40,000 barrels a day, the hard cap containment system won’t be ready until next month, and Louisiana has a new tourist attraction as well as a lot of dead birds. Come to the Gulf and grab a blob of souvenir oil to remind you of mankind’s ill-conceived reliance on oil. The anti-immigration debate in the U.S. heated up last week when a 15 year-old year old Mexican boy trying to smuggle illegal aliens across the border was shot to death by a U.S. border guard. Perhaps we should loosen the immigration rules a little and simply insist that the immigrants move to our less populated areas, like North Dakota, Iowa, Nebraska … the Louisiana coast. Just kidding.

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 6/7/10

This is the first Spring since we built the house when we have been able to begin to reclaim our land from the construction site it has been. It’s going to be a while before these grounds look presentable; we have 2.7 acres to clean up. The first thing we did was seed the topsoil which was spread last Fall. It took a while, but now we are beginning to see a carpet of green where once there was once only mud. Because it’s been a dry Spring, that meant watering every day. It’s paid off; we can now walk on our side yard without sinking ankle deep into mud. I’ve become a gardening fool over the past month, and for the past two weeks, I have been busy planting perennial flowers around our property. As a self-proclaimed brown thumb, I tend to plant things that take care of themselves. A few years ago, while we were still well into the construction phase of this never ending project, I scattered wildflower seeds here and there around the property. Last year some of them came up, but this year the place is exploding with them. Originally, we had grand landscaping plans for the large open area behind our house, but when our septic system mysteriously expanded to became twice as large as was originally planned, trees were out of the question. As anyone with a septic system knows, trees should not be planted over tile beds, because the roots interfere with it’s proper performance. Now, the best I can do are non-invasive plants which do not throw big roots. I did plant a small vegetable garden in the front,  but I cheated. After trying to germinate tomato plant seeds, I finally gave up and bought already started plants.Germination requires way too much attention. Like I said, I have a brown thumb.



I’m shocked … Al and Tipper Gore are calling it quits after 40 years of marital bliss! Personally, I think you need to be an “oxymoron” to believe in marital bliss. I suggest two possible scenarios which led to this tragic breakup. Scenario one: Al’s gay, the mother of all inconvenient truths. Scenario two: the Tipster simply got sick of hearing him rant on about global warming. As the self-proclaimed inventor of the internet and savior of the planet, perhaps Al just got too big for his britches. If you’ve seen him lately, that’s not hard to believe.


I read in the Saturday Star that Apple is introducing a new iPhone today with even more bells and whistles than the last one had. Being the techno moron that I am, I probably couldn’t figure out the old one. In fact, I’m due for a new phone from my cell phone provider - I’m eligible for a new one every three years - and I’m having trouble finding one to suit my limited needs. My old phone was fine, but the keypad is worn out. I just want a new one that does the same things the old one did. Everything these days has features I don’t use or want. I will never watch television on my phone, nor do I intend to use it as a movie camera. As well, I don’t expect to play “Dragonslayer II” on it. I’ll do my violent video game playing on a large screen thank you. What I CAN use is better reception and coverage, as well as the same anemic features my old phone has. The other day I got a new phone and returned it within 24 hours. Though I was told that it was an improvement over my old phone, it did not provide the one feature I need on a cell phone; the ability to disable the roaming feature. The other problem with the new phone was that the On/Off button was right next to the button connecting to the internet. I accidentally connected to the internet three or four times and in so doing ran up about $15 in charges. While the new and improved phone can probably download “War and Peace” in three minutes, I could care less. There is no way I intend to do my web surfing on a two inch screen! So now I’ve re-activated my old phone and I suppose I’ll look around for an obsolete phone to meet my needs. And progress marches on …



Al and Tipper … who knew. Who’s next … George and Laura?

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 6/1/10

This week I begin this report with a rant about banks. Lately, I have been astounded by all the little ways my Canadian bank has been sticking it to me. They’ve added lots of little hidden fees, they take two points off the posted exchange rate for the privilege of transferring money from my U.S. account to my Canadian account; more if I use a Canadian credit card to pay for something in the U.S., and as well, their holds on funds seem unreasonably long. Turnover at my bank is constant, and every time I try to establish a relationship with my “relationship manager” or whatever they call the representative at my branch assigned to assist me with my accounts, he or she leaves the bank and I am faced with the prospect of proving myself to another young face. License and identification please … and after fifteen years with the same bank, one hopes that one does not need to explain that one has been and continues to be a loyal customer. But on top of all of these petty inconveniences, we have just been faced with what appears to be a gross miscarriage of justice, and it is keeping me awake at night. Without going into great detail, an important document was ignored by a bank, authorizing someone in our family to act on another’s behalf. Because the document was executed by a failing member of our family, we don’t want to and should not need to have to get her sign the document again. For some reason, the bank is stonewalling us and I am getting the uncomfortable feeling they’ve crossed the line. You cannot believe how impossible they have been, and they are overtly denying the directions of someone who cannot at present speak for herself. My suspicion is that it is in the bank’s best interest to delay the execution of the document, and they are intentionally using their bureaucracy to keep it from happening. With all the other challenges facing us right now, we don’t have time or the energy to fight with a possibly corrupt bank manager in order to enforce the wishes of a failing member of our family. If we don’t fight this then another peripheral member of the family is free to manipulate the estate to his advantage. We have reason to believe he already has done so and we want to stop it. We are now faced with the complicated dilemma of trying to decide which is worse. The dying wishes of a family member are not being honored, but do we put her under undo stress to re-execute a document, or do we let another family member take advantage of her compromised position. I used to think that nonsense like this only happened in the movies, but it has become painfully clear now that it happens in real life as well. The more people I talk to, the more stories I hear about greedy family members scrambling for their cut of an estate. We don’t want this woman’s money - she can give it all to the SPCA for all we care - we just hate to see people get away with doing things which are so clearly wrong. For every Bernie Madoff who is caught, there seem to be two that don’t.




In the news last week it was reported that they had succeeded in plugging up that damaged BP oil well; there was even video showing that the gushing had stopped. Apparently the fix did not take, and now it may be August before the gushing oil can be diverted to another line. Things are heating up in the Middle East as Israel is condemned for raiding a ship carrying food and supplies ( and guns?) to Gaza. Obviously, both sides are trying to spin this one, but there is a lot of video footage of the incident and perhaps that will help sort out the truth. Gary “Different Strokes” Coleman croaked last week at the age of 42 and Dennis Hopper bit the bazooka as well. He was 74. I first saw Hopper play the drug-addled hippie biker in “Easy Rider” and that character really annoyed me, but I did like his over-the-top performance in David Lynch’s “Blue Velvet”. Lee DeWyze is new American Idol, and though I didn’t follow the competition as I have in past years, I did watch the season finale. I was impressed by the list of guest stars who performed. Perhaps because it marked the send off Simon Cowell who is leaving the show for good, they brought in some big guns (Joe Cocker, Bee Gees, Michael MacDonald, Alanis Morissette, Hall and Oates, Janet Jackson, and others) to perform with the idols. I still think Ryan Seabreeze is a hosehead, but that’s television. The Flyers play the Black Hawks for the Stanley Cup. At least it’s not one of those Western expansion teams again. I’ve hated Philly “Broad Street Bullies” ever since they defeated the Sabres for the Cup back in the 70’s, so I’m rooting for the Hawks. They’re up two games and favored to win. Tropical Storm Agnes walloped Central America, it snowed in Edmonton, there were floods in Winnipeg, forest fires are raging in Quebec, and it’s hot as hell here in parched Central Ontario. As hurricane season approaches, I wonder where all that oil in the Gulf will blow.



Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED