Whistleblower’s Open Letter to Canadians
Continue readingAuthor: Norman Farrell
Northern Insights / Perceptivity: Still Waiting
Accountable to no one, part 1, from February 20, 2011 Before today, I sent out a few messages asking questions related to alleged journalists being paid to attend events sponsored by those associated with groups the journalist, or their colleagues, may cover. For example, on February 17, I sent this
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Bob Mackin poses a good question
B.C. Place’s field of fire, 2010 Gold Rush, NEWS AND VIEWS ON VANCOUVER 2010 (AND BEYOND) FROM BOB MACKIN. “What is the final cost of the stadium for taxpayers? How much is it over the $563 million figure that PavCo has mysteriously stopped quoting? Will it require the auditor general
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: No foreign interests allowed
H/T Creekside Enbridge’s pipeline of distortions, by Harsha Walia, a Vancouver-based activist and writer trained in law, Vancouver Sun, January 2012. “…Delightful commentaries over the past few days have taken Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Natural Resource Minister Joe Oliver to task for their desperate theories about radical foreign environmentalists
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Bill Moyers returns
Moyers & Company Show 102: On Crony Capitalism from BillMoyers.com on Vimeo. David Stockman, former Reagan Budget Director, “If they’re too big too fail, they’re too big to exist.” Stockman, quoted by Tim Dickinson in How the GOP Became the Party of the Rich, Rolling Stone, November 9, 2011: “The
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Notable case regarding aboriginal rights
From Lexology.com The Wahgoshig First Nation (“WFN”) in Northern Ontario has obtained an injunction to temporarily stop Solid Gold Resources Corp. (“Solid Gold”), a junior mining company, from drilling on their First Nation Treaty lands. In a decision released last week (2011 ONSC 7708 (CanLII)), Justice Brown of the Ontario
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Self-interested blather from Edge of the Ledge
Wonderful demonstration today of how BC’s tight little circle of political reporters is wilfully blind to the real issue at stake in the CBC conflict of interest matter. Of course, I did not expect anything else from this trio on CKNW because I question their own journalistic ethics because of
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: CBC conflict of interest complaints upheld
The CBC Ombudsman has agreed with me and others who raised the issue of Stephen Smart’s conflict of interest. Now, we await the corporation’s resolution of this matter. You can read the entire Ombudsman report here but the important section is this: “…Whether a real or perceived conflict of interest,
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: NEB serves industry, not the public
I’ve long been aware of the National Energy Board but never paid much attention to it. However, for my article Regulators throwing loaded dice, I had a look at backgrounds of the people involved in the NEB. I was immediately reminded of a quote from police psychologist Mike Webster used
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: If oil industry so wonderful, why the subsidies?
Pumped Up in Sides 3 Updated Enbridge Profile
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Regulators throwing loaded dice
Propaganda is a tool favoured by leaders who suppose unthinking citizens can’t determine the common interest. Noam Chomsky says it is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state. The tar sands extraction industry and parasitical agents like Ethical Oil, along with Stephen Harper’s government, are investing
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Romney pays 15% tax on $200m personal fortune
Mitt Romney: the gaffes in full, Josh Marshall, The Guardian “As a fabulously wealthy man running to be the president of a country that prides itself on its middle class identity, Romney is permanently striving for the common touch while somehow keeping it real about just how different his life
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Sign of the apocalypse
Twinkies maker Hostess seeks bankruptcy protection, Associated Press, January 11, 2012 “NEW YORK — Hostess Brands Inc., the maker of Twinkies and Wonder Bread, is seeking bankruptcy protection, blaming its [labour costs] and tough economic conditions. “The filing on Wednesday comes just two years after a predecessor company emerged from bankruptcy
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: When politics and science diverge
Regardless of its ultimate conclusions about the decline of Fraser River sockeye salmon, the Cohen Commission‘s December hearings may have exposed the most critical of all issues: federal and provincial regulators operate for the present day benefit of industry instead of in the public’s long term interests. Dr. Alexandra Morton
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Dystopia is our neighbour
The US schools with their own police, Chris McGreal, The Guardian, Jan. 9, 2012 “…Like hundreds of schools in the state [Texas], and across large parts of the rest of the US, Fulmore Middle has its own police force with officers in uniform who carry guns to keep order in the
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Toward amoral petro-state
An Open Reply to Joe Oliver’s Propaganda for the Petro State ENERGY & EQUITY: Nikiforuk joins the fray. Andrew Nikiforuk, The Tyee “Canada’s Natural Resource Minister Joe Oliver has just pulled a Hugo Chavez: he’s penned a formal and desperate attack on democracy and interfered in the nation’s allegedly impartial
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Treading on the public welfare
News Item, January 11, 2012: “Shaw Media announced Wednesday that it has filed an application to the CRTC for a 24/7 regional, all-news channel for the province. “The channel is set to launch this summer, pending approval from the CRTC, which is the country’s broadcasting regulator. The new channel will
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Judging the judge, again
Also read: J. Leask: Questions of perspicacity and impartiality B.C. Appeal Court overturns cocaine conspiracy acquittal…, Neal Hall, Vancouver Sun, Jan. 10, 2012 “VANCOUVER — A three-judge panel of the B.C. Court of Appeal has overturned the acquittal of four men accused of a cocaine trafficking conspiracy and has ordered
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: "Mistruths and half-truths" from our government
Stephen Harper’s Northern Gateway pipeline parody, National Affairs Columnist Thomas Walkom, The Star “The federal government’s claim that big-money foreign interests are trying to hijack hearings into a proposed west coast oil pipeline is, at one level, high parody. It is also deeply disturbing. “…The bad foreign interests are the
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