The United Nations has declared September 15th the International Day of Democracy. Fair Vote Canada is expanding the day to Democracy Week, September 12th to the 18th. The week, according to Fair Vote’s website, is all about “participating, celebrating…
Continue readingAuthor: Bill Longstaff
Barbie dolls are killing Chinese workers
Harmless, Barbie dolls are not. They are, in fact, responsible for exploitation, misery, and even death for thousands of innocents. According to the human rights group Students and Scholars Against Corporate Misbehaviour (SACOM), a Sturdy Products fact…
Continue readingSweden: hIgh taxes and highly competitive
The daily press, diligently promoting the interests of its corporate owners, continually insists that taxes must be kept low to ensure Canada’s economy is competitive. This refrain is dutifully chorused by conservative politicians. It is not, however, …
Continue readingAmericans pissed at politicians, particularly at the GOP
This has been a summer of discontent in American politics. According to The Pew Research Center, 79 per cent of the U.S. public are dissatisfied with the way things are going in their country and even more are frustrated or angry with their federal go…
Continue readingFukushima—radiation damage that just won’t quit
I admit to a love-hate relationship with nuclear power. One day I am all for it because of the large amounts of relatively green power it can provide. I wonder if we can seriously reduce our dependence on fossil fuels without it. And then an incident l…
Continue readingBusting the union-busting bills
Anti-union legislation has been all the rage in the U.S. following last November’s election of a number of right-wing governors. Most notorious is Wisconsin’s Scott Walker, infamous for his polarizing union law that strips most public employees of thei…
Continue readingGoldman Sachs boss lawyers up
Will justice ever be done? This is a question U.S Investors have been asking about the recent financial crisis. Specifically, they have queried why no criminal charges have been laid against Goldman Sachs or any other investment bank whose greed and r…
Continue readingBritain’s class struggle and the proclivity to riot
The British lower classes, like those elsewhere, have for a very long time expressed their grievances with riot against the established order, going back to the Poor riot of 1196, and including the Spitalfield and Gordon riots of the 18th century, the …
Continue readingPeter MacKay, "royal" privilege, and the unelected Senate
Canadians can hardly escape the “royal” connection. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the Royal Winnipeg Ballet, the Royal Canadian Mint, the Royal Ontario Museum … the list is endless. To say nothing of the royal visage staring out at us from our…
Continue readingDavid Cameron, former Bullingdon bully, criticizes rioters
It is always such a challenge to divorce the class angle from British affairs. Two of the most vociferous critics of the recent rioters in London and other cities have been Prime Minister David Cameron and London mayor Boris Johnson. As it turns out, t…
Continue readingA lesson in hypocrisy from King Abdullah
Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah has condemned Syria’s Assad regime for its suppression of pro-democracy dissenters and withdrawn his ambassador. This is a very civilized thing to do in the face of the brutality taking place in that country.Coming from Abd…
Continue readingCoca Cola sponsors the Pope
What would Jesus do? Would he take a trip to Spain that cost the Spanish taxpayers, in the midst of a severe economic crisis, $80 million while accepting sponsorship from over 100 corporations, including Coca Cola?Apparently 100 Spanish priests don’t t…
Continue readingStability in South Asia?
Suspended because of the terrorist attacks on Mumbai in 2008, peace talks between India and Pakistan are back on. Foreign ministers of the two countries have held a formal meeting in New Delhi that brought effusive comments from both parties.The Indian…
Continue readingWealth gap in the U.S.—100 years of progress lost
A lost century—inequality in the U.S. is more extreme than it has been in almost 100 years. The gap between the ultra-rich and the poor and middle class has widened dramatically over the last 30 years. The richest one per cent of Americans…
Continue readingFormer Iranian Guard commander to become OPEC boss
Now this is interesting. Brigadier General Rostam Ghasemi, a senior commander in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, has been approved by Iran’s parliament as the country’s next oil minister. This automatically makes him head of OPEC as Iran assumed the…
Continue readingThe "most Catholic country" slips away
Pope Paul VI once referred to Ireland as “the most Catholic country in the world.” Now it seems the Irish are slipping the Vatican’s leash. Abortion on demand remains illegal and most citizens describe themselves as Catholic, but the Irish people are …
Continue readingCrime—the declining problem
Down, down, down it goes. According to Stats Can’s latest report, our crime rate has dropped again, down five per cent from 2009 to 2010, now in decline for 20 years. Particularly impressive was the 10 per cent drop in the murder rate, and perhaps even…
Continue readingThe energy ministers’ Orwellian statement
The news release and action plan issued by the provincial energy ministers following their recent conference in Kananaskis stepped rather lightly over environmental concerns. Perhaps this is not unexpected at a meeting paid for in part by oil companies…
Continue readingCanada’s growing income gap: It isn’t the size of the pie, it’s the size of the pieces
According to the Conference Board of Canada’s report How Canada Performs, we are becoming a more unequal society. Although, in the period 1976 to 2009, all Canadians were better off in real dollars, the poor and the middle class have gained only margin…
Continue readingIt all began with Maggie and Ron
The modern march to free market supremacy is often thought to have begun with the ascendancy of the conservative regimes of Margaret Thatcher in the U.K. and the Ronald Reagan in the U.S. One of its ultimate—and inevitable—outcomes was the recent c…
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