Facts: I don’t hate Vision Vancouver. I’m indifferent to the overall career of Gregor Robertson. I actually like Andrea Reimer, from what I know of her. (Confession: I really like […]
Continue readingTag: accountability
LeDaro: His Highness Stephen Harper does not answer questions
Inconsiderate reporters waste the time of His Majesty Stephen Harper. Following video speaks volumes about Harper’s attitude. He is accountable to no one. It is a shame. Who would have thought that we will have dictatorship in Canada.
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: Stealing Democracy Part X: How Far Does The Rot Go?
There is no doubt any more that Bill C-23 is deliberately designed to enable the CPC (or other political parties) to engage in the kind of electoral fraud that the CPC has attempted, and been caught out at repeatedly in the past. Worse, it goes so far as to politicize
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Following up on yesterday’s column, David Atkins discusses his own preference for front-end fixes to poverty and inequality: The standard way you’ll hear most progressives address inequality issues is to allow the labor market to run as usual, but levy heavy taxes on
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – David Atkins emphasizes the need for progressive parties and activists to discuss big ideas rather than settling for the path of least short-term resistance: Both the poor and the middle class feel threatened and increasingly pessimistic. Opinions of elite institutions across the board
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your weekend. – Nick Kristof writes that the growing gap in income reflects a similarly growing gap in social perception – and that there’s plenty of need to reduce both: There is an income gap in America, but just as important is a compassion gap. Plenty
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Ken Georgetti discusses how the corporate tax giveaways of the past 15 years have hurt most Canadians: The Conservative government and special interest groups claim incessantly that cutting corporate income taxes is good for the economy and for individual Canadians. We have
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your Sunday reading. – Joseph Stiglitz discusses the link between perpetually-increasing inequality and the loss of social trust: Unfortunately, however, trust is becoming yet another casualty of our country’s staggering inequality: As the gap between Americans widens, the bonds that hold society together weaken. So, too, as more
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on how Michael Chong’s Reform Act privileges members of Parliament over party members and supporters – and how there’s far more reason for concern about a lack of genuine grassroots input as matters stand now than about the influence of MPs. For further reading…– I’ll point to Andrew Coyne
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Jim Stanford reminds us that even Statistics Canada’s already-galling numbers showing increased inequality in Canada understate the problem, as they fail to reflect capital gains (and the preferential tax treatment thereof): Yesterday’s release from Statistics Canada on the income share of the wealthy
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Alison chronicles how the definition of “accountability” has changed since the Cons’ own actions started to come under the microscope, while Paul Wells writes about the three different interests at play in the Cons’ scandal. And Tonda MacCharles explores how the Senate bribery
Continue readingBlevkog: A quote from a former opposition leader:
At worst, he personally ordered it done and chose the people who executed the plan. At the very least, he fostered an attitude within the party […], chose the managers of the people who committed these crimes and completely and utterly failed to exercise any oversight, supervision or leadership. In
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Frances Russell finds that authoritarianism and bozo eruptions are two of the defining characteristics of right-wing politics in Canada: Put simply, the double standard states “ I can do it but you can’t because…” followed by a lengthy list of inequalities: because I’m
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – George Monbiot writes that corporate control over a political system may be a huge factor in limiting public participation – even as it makes a substantial counterweight all the more important: The political role of business corporations is generally interpreted as that of
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Mother Jones’ Modest Proposal
Like me, you probably share that sinking feeling that privacy is gone for good, dead without so much as a fight. If you want a reasonable degree of privacy any more you have to live self-sustainably in a cabin on a lake deep in the forest and hope you’re not
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Don Braid comments on Alberta’s complete lack of credibility when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental issues. And Andrew Leach nicely sums up the PC/Con position in trying to put a happy face on growing emissions: Suppose you run
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: There Is No Honour Among Thieves
Make no mistake about it, I have little sympathy for Mike Duffy. When I caught wind of his political aspirations several years before he became a Senator, he ceased to be among the journalists that I had much respect for. That said, Duffy’s last couple of speeches in the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Andrew Coyne highlights the ultimate issue in the Cons’ Senate patronage, scandals and cover-ups: (I)f the prime minister sets the standard, then we are entitled to ask: Why has this standard been so inconsistent? On essentially the same set of facts, the senators
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Tom Bergin reports on a predictable corporate attack on the very idea of government sovereignty – as tax evaders are insisting that their own demand for “certainty” in the availability of tax havens should trump the ability of tax authorities to assess where
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Joseph Stiglitz reminds us that inequality isn’t an inevitability, but a choice favoured (and lobbied for) by the few who want to remove themselves from the general public: (W)idening income and wealth inequality in America is part of a trend seen across
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