Progressive Bloggers // Blogues progressistes

cartoon life: Ministers of the faith #9

Oct

19

2017

Filed under: art

Warren Kinsella: There’s a political lie for every occasion

Oct

19

2017

DeSmogBlog: What Does the Future Hold for Vancouver Island’s Last Standing Old-Growth Forests?

Oct

19

2017

By Torrance Coste and Mark Worthing Last March, we travelled to northern Vancouver Island and hosted four public meetings about logging in the span of five days. The topics? The loss of old-growth rainforests, raw log exports, and how unsustainable forestry is impacting ecosystems and communities up and down the Island. The meetings were tense, emotional, and exhausting. ...

Anti-Racist Canada: The ARC Collective: Guest Article: What’s Going on in Québec? (Part 1)

Oct

19

2017

As we saw on September 30, many far-right groups across Canada tried to rally against “illegal” immigration but ended up gathering only a handful of protesters, largely outnumbered by anti-racist activists. Everywhere except in Québec. In Québec, the groups gathered at Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle, at the border between Canada and the US, and managed to attract over ...

CuriosityCat: The Pope: The one man who can save Spain.

Oct

19

2017

Spain’s problem can be solved by one man: the Pope. How? Simple. The Pope invites (commands?) the two leaders of Spain and Catalonia to meet with him and his advisors, in the Vatican. As part of the public invitation, the Pope sets out a few topics that he will raise at the meeting, (Read more…) ...

ffibs: Tragically hip, indeed.

Oct

19

2017

Not all of us get to leave so well. Filed under: Cartoons (Single Panel)

DeSmogBlog: As Salmon Farm Tensions Escalate, Watchdog Finds Feds Failed to Fully Implement Cohen Commission Recommendations

Oct

19

2017

The federal government is playing a shell game, claiming to have acted on most of the Cohen Commission recommendations, but failing to fully implement many of them, say critics, pointing to lack of action on fundamental issues such as fish farms and removing responsibility for the promotion of salmon farming from Fisheries and Oceans Canada. “They ...

TaylorOwen.com: Is Facebook a threat to democracy?

Oct

19

2017

I have an oped in the Globe today in reaction to Facebook’s Canadian Election Integrity Initiative. In short, I think we are missing the structural problem: The system of surveillance capitalism that has resulted in a market for our attention. Here is a twitter thread that elaborates on this, And here is is the oped. Lead: ...

TaylorOwen.com: Lecture on Fakenews and democracy

Oct

19

2017

Technology and new media are facilitating a rapid shift in the ways in which we consume news. In the shift from print to digital, companies like Facebook – and the algorithms it engineers – are replacing traditional editors and publishers. The result is “surveillance capitalism”: a powerful system that can target specific groups to sell ...

DeSmogBlog: Why A Canadian Mining Company Is Suing Romania for $4.4 Billion

Oct

19

2017

Canadian mining company Gabriel Resources is suing Romania for $4.4 billion through a secretive tribunal after the country denied permits for the largest open-pit gold and silver mine in Europe — a project Canadian officials advocated for, according to documents obtained by DeSmog Canada. Since 1997, the Canadian mining company (fun fact: it was founded by ...

daveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Alberta’s Boundary Commission recommends new Electoral Map for 2019

Oct

19

2017

The final report of the Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission has been released. Here are the maps of Alberta, Edmonton and Calgary that the commission is recommending be drawn for the next provincial general election. I will have more analysis of these maps on the blog later tonight.

The Disaffected Lib: Have the Republicans Developed "Stockholm Syndrome"?

Oct

19

2017

An article in Foreign Policy by displaced former Republican pundit Max Boot suggests that Congressional Republicans have capitulated to Donald Trump’s will and have begun accelerating his and their own “race to the bottom.” The lobotomization of the Republican Party appeared complete last year when the same GOP paladins who had denounced Donald Trump as a ...

Warren Kinsella: Recipe For Hate is out!

Oct

19

2017

Was just at Dundurn Press (and I’m now at the Patrician Grill to celebrate, where else) and they gave me a pile of copies of my new book, Recipe For Hate – and the good folks there told me that they’ve received a historically-huge order of the book from the US! Off to the Windsor ...

The Disaffected Lib: Another Sign? I Sure Hope Not.

Oct

19

2017

Something has changed over the past two years. My home is bordered along the back by a row of large cedar trees. When I moved here some 15 years ago one of the delights I discovered was being awakened in the mornings by the chirps and songs of a seemingly massive variety of small birds ...

Parchment in the Fire: Precarious Employment and Working Poverty in ‘Post-Crisis’ Greece

Oct

19

2017

In a September post on the Social Europe website, Syriza MEP Dimitris Papadimoulis claimed that Greece is now ‘exiting the crisis.’ To support his claim, he cites data suggesting that investment is ‘back on track’, exports have risen 18% – the highest rate since 2001 – and that unemployment has fallen to 21%, down from ...

Accidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links

Oct

19

2017

This and that for your Thursday reading. – Peter Whoriskey examines how inequality is becoming increasingly pronounced among U.S. seniors. And Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson discuss how inequality contributes to entrenching social divisions: The toll which inequality exacts from the vast majority of society is one of the most important limitations on the quality of life – particularly ...

mark a rayner: Rejected Halloween-Themed Cereals

Oct

19

2017

After the success of Count Chocula, Boo-berry and Frankenberry, cereal executives everywhere were on the look out for new Halloween-themed cereals. Alas, these never made it to market, though the last entry did make it to the packaging design phase. (This happens BEFORE taste testing, I should note.) 10. Candy Corn Pops 9. Werewolf Balls ...

Things Are Good: Using a Blockchain for a Smarter Energy Grid

Oct

19

2017

Blockchain technology stems from Bitcoin and provides a platform for change greater than Bitcoin itself. Researchers in the renewable energy industry have realized that blockchains can be used to replace outdated billing and tracking. Presently when a company produces energy it requires verification form other companies and each step eats into profits – a more ...

Accidental Deliberations: New column day

Oct

19

2017

Here, on the latest confirmation from the Parliamentary Budget Office that a national pharmacare plan would both improve our health and save public money – and the Libs’ and Cons’ insistence on standing in the way. For further reading…– Brent Patterson weighs in on the Libs’ refusal to work toward a national pharmacare plan, while ...

Wise Law Blog: LawFact of the Day: Wills and Estates

Oct

19

2017

Here is your daily LawFact from Wise Law for Thursday October 19, 2017. Today we are talking about Wills and Estates. When a person is married in Ontario, the marriage automatically revokes a prior Last Will made by that person. The sole exception to this rule is a Last Will that is specifically made in ...

Politics and its Discontents: The Foundering Ship Of State: A Followup

Oct

19

2017

Following up on last evening’s post, I am adding the comments of Gyor, who listed several more failures of the Trudeau government thus far: You forgot Trudeau’s attempt to increasingly centralize power in Parliament. Many parliamentary posts still go unfilled 2 years in, the filling of which Chantal Herbert called the governmental equivant of tying ...

Warren Kinsella: Would you invite a neo-Nazi to your house? (Updated! Happy ending!)

Oct

19

2017

Of course you wouldn’t. But Ontario’s three main political parties did. A committee comprised of all the main parties in the Ontario Legislature have given Canada’s leading white supremacist an opportunity to speak to them about abortion. I’m not making this up. Paul Fromm is one of the most notorious haters on the planet. A ...

Northern Reflections: A Total Screw Up

Oct

19

2017

Surely, no man has screwed up more consistently — and spectacularly — than Donald Trump. Witness has treatment of the family of a dead soldier. Richard Wolfe writes: This week the commander-in-chief has somehow contrived to drive to tears the grieving mother of one of his own special forces. Along the way, he boasted about ...

Montreal Simon: Celebrating the Day Justin Trudeau Defeated the Harper Cons

Oct

19

2017

It's now been two years to the day since Canadians gave Justin Trudeau a crushing majority. And he sent Stephen Harper packing… And into the garbage can of history. Who can forget what a magical night it was? And who can forget what the Cons looked like once it was over.Read more »

Montreal Simon: Gord Downie and the Spirit of Chanie Wenjack

Oct

19

2017

Like everybody else I knew Gord Downie was dying, from an aggressive form of brain cancer that grows fast and spreads quickly.But I was amazed at how long he lasted before death finally claimed him.I was impressed by all the things he managed to do in the time he had left.And nothing moved me more than this.Read ...