Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman. Photo courtesy US State Department/Wikimedia Commons. On March 11, online media outlet The Breach published a document that shines a light on Ottawa’s usually secretive policies toward Saudi Arabia and the wider West Asian region. The document illustrates that Canada’s cozy relationship with the
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : Conservative Blame Game.
It is difficult these days to have friends or relations who like voting conservative. When I was younger there was a different type of conservative. Some were actually commendable. For example, I liked former prime minister John Diefenbaker. I don’t think I ever said a nasty word about him, until
Continue readingCathie from Canada: Today’s News: Saskatchewan has created another cat party
A new provincial political party recently formed here, calling themselves the Sask United Party, which intends to out-conservative the existing Saskatchewan Party. Basically, I think its just another Cat party trying to pretend to be mice (see above for a video about Tommy Douglas’ “Mouseland” analogy) If the anti-immigrant, anti-science
Continue readingIN-SIGHTS: Overtaxed or underserved?
Metro Vancouver and 21 lower mainland municipalities reported total accumulated surpluses of $42 billion in 2021. That was seven times the annual expenses reported in 2021 by the same local governments…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: MLA Dan Williams’ beer guzzling in the Legislature is just another episode in the UCP’s sophomoric obsession with alcohol
Peace River MLA Dan Williams’ distasteful display of beer guzzling on the floor of Alberta’s Legislature last week is just another embarrassing episode in the United Conservative Party’s sophomoric obsession with consumption of alcohol that seems to date back to the selection of Jason Kenney as the party’s first leader.
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: Who Do You Trust?
In less than 70 days Albertans will decide whether Daniel Smith’s UCP or Rachel Notley’s NDP will form the next government. Political junkies like me have pretty much made up our minds about who’s getting our vote, but we’re always interested in what others are thinking. which was why I
Continue readingScripturient: The Father of Modern English
As I promised in a previous post, here’s my almost certainly true and accurate explanation of why the language you’re reading now is the result of one man’s writing back in the 14th century. Yes, of course, I mean Chaucer; author of The Canterbury Tales. Thanks to him, you’re reading this
Continue readingQueer-liberal: This week’s tonic: “Canada’s spies and the hypocrites who adore them – Did China interfere in Canada’s elections? We don’t know. But journalists must not rely on friendly leaks for the truth.”
This week’s tonic by columnist Andrew Mitrovica: “Canada’s spies and the hypocrites who adore them – Did China interfere in Canada’s elections? We don’t know. But journalists must not rely on friendly leaks for the truth.” “I am the author of one of two books of any consequence written about
Continue readingQueer-liberal: Today’s tonic: “20 years after the Iraq War, it’s clear our elites learned no lessons”
Today’s tonic from Taylor C. Noakes is a public historian and independent journalist: “20 years after the Iraq War, it’s clear our elites learned no lessons…Two decades on from the deceit and disaster of a war that claimed as many as one million Iraqi lives, no one has been held
Continue readingwmtc: what i’m reading: my notorious life by kate manning (madame restell, fictional version, nonfiction to follow)
I read this book last year, and have been recommending it nonstop, so it’s about time to commit it to wmtc. My Notorious Life was an obvious book for me to love — or to hate. Much historical fiction feels contrived to me. An author takes a period of history, writes
Continue readingNorthern Reflections: The Same Man The Same Danger
Donald Trump is doing it again. He’s summoning the mob. The Washington Post reports: Former president Donald Trump called for protests Saturday in response to what he claimed would be his imminent arrest in a Manhattan criminal investigation, even as his advisers said Trump’s team does not have specific knowledge
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay : What Leadership?
The one thing for sure in Canada these days that we do not waste time recognizing leadership. Leadership is a political ghost. It is something that politicians talk about but we never see it. It leaves us craving answers, direction, solutions and leaving us with the fear of missing out.
Continue readingAlberta Politics: UCP now wants underwhelming minimum wage report, a typical Jason Kenney production, to be quickly forgotten
I suppose as good place as any to get back in to the swim of blogging is Friday’s release by Danielle Smith’s United Conservative Party Government of the three-year-old report on the supposed impact of the $15 minimum wage brought in by Rachel Notley’s NDP Government in 2018. Alberta Premier
Continue readingWarren Kinsella: I love Saskatchewan
Another Sask. pic.twitter.com/QVNVL5lgeO — Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 18, 2023 Does it look like Sask, to Sask folks? Someone in Ottawa says it doesn't at all. Views welcome. pic.twitter.com/lVvP9VstnE — Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 15, 2023
Continue readingAnti-Racist Canada: The ARC Collective: Neo-Nazi Kevin Goudreau is a Symptom of a Larger Problem
Those of you how have followed the blog for years know that Kevin Goudreau, a neo-Nazi active now for more than 30 years, has been covered on these pages mostly in the spirit of how he deserves to be treated. As a joke whom even other right wing extremists who
Continue readingQueer-liberal: I’m starting to think Justin Trudeau needs to retire in order to stave off the regressive threat of Pierre Poilievre
This article, “Neither Trudeau nor Poilievre is shooting straight these days”, by Shachi Kurl, President of the Angus Reid Institute, made me think a lot about the next federal election in Canada. It lays bare the many recent mistakes and inherent flaws of Justin Trudeau and Pierre Poilievre: “The prime minister
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: The future of dental care in Canada
A child having their teeth cleaned by a dental therapist in a school-based dental clinic in Saskatchewan. “Here is the tool that removes the bugs. It sounds like an airplane and washes the bugs from your teeth.” Photo by Leslie Topola. The following is an excerpt from the forthcoming book,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your weekend reading. – Alejandro de la Garza writes about the devastation continuing to be wrought by COVID-19 in Lamb County, Texas even as the powers that be pretend the pandemic is in the past. And John Michael McGrath discusses why Ontario shouldn’t count on the Ford
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