Life As Performance Art 22

From time to time I come up with a brilliant idea. At least, at the time it seems brilliant, then later, after further reflection, thought, input from others, study and research, I will find that it maybe wasn't so brilliant after all, and might even be quite hare-brained and stupid. But this idea, I think is going to be brilliant, enduringly brilliant, and here goes. It is about housing and money-laundering here in our fabulous berg of Vancouver. I began today, shortly after waking, thinking of all the huge congestion in some parts of my city, particularly in the West End and downtown core. And I was thinking of how utterly asinine that they are still permitting the developer scum to build forty story or higher condo towers in an area that is already past its peak in density. There simply is not any room left here for squeezing in new towers, but they keep doing it anyway and this is only going to further compromise the quality of life for those of us who already live in these places. There is still tremendous resistance against increasing density in many neighbourhoods, especially on our tony and fabulously expensive west side. I say, Too Bad! They should have started putting up towers in some of those privileged hoods long ago, starting with erecting a thirty story condo tower right next door to Moonbeam's mansion on Point Grey Road. Moonbeam, as many of you will know, was our mayor, Gregor Robertson, here in Vancouver these last ten years and it was he who opened the Pandora's Box, letting in all the greedy developer scum, thanks to whom this city has become affordable only to the wealthy. With the BC Liberals running the province and the federal Conservatives in Ottawa, our country was basically being governed for several years without a moral compass and the venal greedy idiots in our own city hall simply helped exacerbate things. It seems almost disingenuous that so many people seem surprised that likely billions of dollars have been laundered in Vancouver casinos and in real estate transactions, particularly in Shaughnessy Heights. Palatial homes are being bought and sold in this real estate shell game, criminals fattening their pockets on dealing fentanyl and other lethal narcotics are living in them, and no one is lifting a finger to bust those bastards and kick them out of the country. This has nothing to do with racism, by the way, and not all the culprits are Chinese. It has everything to do with regaining control over this beast that threatens to make Vancouver unliveable to all but the uber wealthy. The drug dealers, their gangs and associates, and their clients who now live in these mansions bought with fraudulently obtained money all have to be flushed out, put under arrest, tried, jailed and where appropriate, deported. That's right, Gentle Reader. The City of Vancouver, with appropriate assistance from provincial and federal levels, is going to have to get those criminals out, and expropriate the houses that they are illegitimately occupying. Instead of reselling these mansions at a profit, they need to be renovated into duplexes, triplexes, townhouses and apartments, and they are going to have to be made available to tenants earning the full range of income, from the relatively well off, to the street homeless. That is correct, Gentle Reader, co-ops and subsidized housing, and really, why shouldn't such beautiful neighbourhoods be accessible to everyone who lives in this city? No one has the human right of occupying for themselves alone and their small families and servants mansions of such dimension and proportion that they could easily house up to twenty tenants in well-designed apartments. The growing crisis in density and the fact that our population is going to only keep on growing makes unthinkable and obscene the very idea that one person should be allowed to live in a mansion occupying half an hectare. Without badly altering or damaging the esthetic of these wealthy neighbourhoods, population density integrating a full range of incomes should not be impossible, and only the greed inspired snobbery of certain wealthy idiots is going to prevent this from ever happening. Mansions, as single family residences, have to be declared obsolete and illegal. They are certainly unethical.