I must say that I was quite surprised the other day to find out that my Conservative MP Jason Kenney, who is known for being one of the meanest and crankiest men in Ottawa, would be meeting with the Dalai Lama during his trip to Vancouver this weekend. My response to that news was 'let's hope he [Kenney] actually learns something from him'.HH the Dalai Lama will also have a closed-door meeting with some corporate types:
Tomorrow, in a setting not open to the public, the Dalai Lama will sit with 60 business titans, all of them partnered with another 60 activists and aid workers. Martha Billes, controlling shareholder of Canadian Tire Corp., is on the well-protected guest list. So is oil and gas man Gwyn Morgan, American lumber baron George Weyerhaeuser, and Ms. Campbell, the former prime minister.
The idea is to match corporate types with people such as environmentalist Severn Suzuki, daughter of David Suzuki, and see what sort of intellectual sparks might fly.
Some guests for the Sunday session have asked organizers not to release their names, says event organizer Charles Holmes, an associate with Simon Fraser University's faculty of business administration. They include "one of the richest philanthropists in New York."
Why the caution? "There is suspicion on both sides," says Mr. Holmes. "Some of the social development people might be afraid that they are seen as selling out. Some corporate folks are afraid that people will be coming to them with outstretched palms."
It's not like those 'corporate folks' can't afford to actually fill some of those outstretched palms. Maybe the Dalai Lama will convince them of that.
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