Like clockwork, about two weeks after Danny Williams last got his mug on the news, the most thin-skinned media hound on the planet got himself a ton more ego-stroking attention. Every two weeks or so. Like clockwork. If you don’t believe it, just do some google searching. (Read more…)
Continue readingAuthor: Ed Hollett
The Sir Robert Bond Papers: Births and Infant Deaths #nlpoli
A recent article in The Atlantic looked at the infant mortality rate in the United States and why it appears so high in comparison to the rest of the world. After all, the Untied States is one of the richest countries in the world with some of the most sophisticated
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Questions and Answers #nlpoli
Unelected cabinet minister Judy Manning was “surprised” that her personal relationship with Paul Davis’ political bagman came up in a recent CBC interview. Surprised? That’s an interesting choice of words. Just like it is interesting for Manning to say that: “Quite frankly, in terms of my predecessors, I don’t recall
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: CHC Helicopters’ shitty public relations #nlpoli
“CHC Helicopters Canada is establishing a presence in St. John’s.” There is something about that comment from a spokesman for a company that, not so very long ago, had its international headquarters in St. John’s that makes you want to either laugh or cry. It’s hard to know which one
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The Vision Thing #nlpoli
The St. John’s Board of Trade is about the only business advocacy group in the world that doesn’t actually believe in free enterprise. The Board doesn’t believe that government should control public debt. They claim they are worried about it, but in practice the Board will shout with joy the
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Pension Judy #nlpoli
Judy Manning will go down in history as the only unelected cabinet minister in Newfoundland and Labrador since the country gained responsible local government in 1855 who went into office with no intention of seeking a seat in the legislature unless and until she was ready to do so. The
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: IMPS SJ Hobby Show – November 9
The local chapter of the International Plastic Modellers Society will be having its annual model show and competition on November 9 at the Arts and Culture Centre in St. John’s. You can find more information at the chapter website along with some samples of what the talented local modelling community
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: It’s what your boobs are for #nlpoli
The first week of October is World Breastfeeding Week. Check out babyfriendlynl.ca and you can find information on some of the activities going on across the province. Breastfeeding is the SRBP cause, for those who don’t know. Check out this post from 2009 that proposes a provincial goal for breastfeeding
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Madness #nlpoli
The day after she took the oath of office, Judy Manning, the province’s new attorney general and minister of public safety, and Premier Paul Davis, her boss, are facing intense public criticism. It’s hard to tell whether people are more upset by her evident, and admitted, lack of experience practicing
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The Usual Suspects #nlpoli
The Conservatives who said Premier Paul Davis was going to doing nothing more than shuffle the cabinet that was already there got it absolutely right. On Tuesday, Davis announced his new cabinet and the names and jobs are all very familiar. To give the illusion of change, Davis re-organized a
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Errors in judgement #nlpoli
March 13, 2014 was a Thursday. Normal cabinet day. According to Auditor General Terry Paddon’s report on the Humber Valley Paving contract, Nick McGrath, then minister of works and transportation called his deputy minister at 8:45 AM and asked him whether he’d heard that HVP wanted to get out of
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: All our yesterdays #nlpoli
Someone in Paul Davis’ campaign has a quirky sense of humour. They picked Bill Clinton’s 1992 election theme music for Davis to use as his walk-in music during the convention. Let’s leave aside the eventual Bill Clinton of stains on little blue dresses and just look at the 1992 presidential
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Premier Davis and the Dead Children #nlpoli
Paul Davis will get a lift down to Government House this afternoon and swear the oath of office so Tom Marshall can finally get out of politics. It’s been about two weeks since Davis won the Conservative Party leadership and that’s a fairly typical period of time between election and
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: No Privacy Protection in Marshall’s Office #nlpoli
Someone sent a request to the Premier’s Office for access to all “Email [sic], memos, letters, notes between Elizabeth Matthews and the premier’s office [sic] between June 1, 2013 and June 1, 2014”. The Premier’s Office sent the person a couple of e-mails. They deleted some information under section 30
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Cabinet documents and deliberations #nlpoli
One of the big changes Bill 29 made to the province’s access to information law was to give a list of documents that could not be released under the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act because they were cabinet documents. Before then, the law in Newfoundland and Labrador,
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Needed: a local think-tank #nlpoli
Anyone who was paying attention to these things has known for about 25 years that the province would face a demographic crunch starting ‘round about now. Anyone who has been reading Bond Papers for any length of time will know that demographics have been a big issue your humble e-scribbler
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Trouble getting SRBP? #nlpoli
Some people have been reporting problems getting SRBP through their Internet service provider or IT support team. It isn’t clear what’s going on, but one of the problems seems to be a unique one confined to the provincial government’s Office of the Chief Information Officer. If you are having trouble
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Edges #nlpoli
The Premier’s Office issued a couple of news releases last week about what someone they called the Premier-Designate would be doing. The first release was a curiosity. The second one made the whole thing very strange since it was plain that Paul Davis would be attending these events as a
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Political Definitions #nlpoli
Political conservatives like to talk about how government ought to be run like a business. They talk about it so much that it’s odd, then, that they never actually do it. Part of it has to do with language. They use words that appear to mean the same thing when,
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: No-brainer #nlpoli
Perhaps it is just Danny Williams’ ingratitude that pisses people off. The multi-millionaire hockey team owner just got a massive subsidy from the taxpayers of St. John’s so that he won’t suffer any lost revenue. It should be a no-brainer for the guy to say thanks to the people who
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