Transparenzia

Oh no, here we go again — another one of those words that doesn't quite exist yet: Transparenzia.

But sometimes it has to be that way, says my lower consciousness with a sly grin. Because this little word-creature crawled out as the very first thought, barely had I sat down to write today’s morning splinter.

What in the world is that supposed to mean?

Transparency? Well, of course. That’s an active state we citizens expect from our government. After all, they were elected by us, should speak accordingly, but above all make their actions and plans public. In other words, to practise transparency — again and again and again.

A worthy aim, simply stated, yet apparently difficult for certain temporary holders of political power to grasp or put into practice. In the orange south of Canada, there is a fine example of what lived political transparency looks like in practice. Barely had the new administration taken office, a little over a year ago, when they made their plans public in a document. Well, credit where credit is due. The paper is called “Project 2025” and can hardly escape a certain logic in its choice of name.

Across more than 900 pages, the goals of Project 2025 were set out in full. No, very little was softened, watered down, or sugar-coated. All the goals stand clearly in black and white on the pages of transparency. I took the trouble — I took the liberty — of defining all 320 goals of Government Orange as a task list. Of those announced tasks, 138 have been completed to date. A full seventy are currently in progress.

How impressive is that?

Hold on — let’s not fling judgements around quite so fast. The devil tends to lurk somewhere, or as in this case, in the famous detail. That’s where he feels most at home.

Ouch.

That is far more transparency than I would ever wish for. I can only hope democracy isn’t reading along — otherwise it might faint on the spot.

Closing your eyes doesn’t help anymore either. George Orwell would agree.

So. Let’s take a look inside.