Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Bea Vongdouangchanh reports on Kevin Page’s concerns that the Cons are set to effectively destroy the PBO. And the Star’s editorial board slams Stephen Harper’s war against transparency and accountability in general: Stonewalling, foot-dragging and contempt for Parliament pay. At least that’s what
Continue readingTag: b.c. libs
Accidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Lawrence Martin discusses how the B.C. Libs, Harper Cons and other governments have responded to transparency requirements by deliberately refusing to record what they’re doing and why: News from the government of British Columbia. Sorry citizens, we have no files. There is
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your Sunday reading. – Chrystia Freeland comments on the disproportionate influence of the super-rich in a democratic system which is supposed to value citizens equally: “I think most Americans believe in the idea of political equality,” Callahan told me. “That idea is obviously corrupted when in 2012,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Tim Harper writes about Scott Vaughan’s final report as the federal environmental commissioner: Scott Vaughan doesn’t have the profile of some of his contemporaries but as the environmental commissioner bowed out with a final report Tuesday, he reminded official Ottawa how much he
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Raz Godelnik challenges the all-too-conventional wisdom that corporations (and indeed individuals) should see tax avoidance and evasion as virtues: One of the most common arguments is that the tax-avoidance techniques used by corporations like Starbucks or Google are legal and therefore they’re not
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On dubious partners
I’ve mostly avoided commenting on the federal Libs’ leadership race based on the need for the party’s own membership (and supportership in this case) to decide on a future direction for itself. But with one of the candidates explicitly running on a platform of cross-party dealings, I’d think there’s some
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on how the Gateway pipeline serves as a prime example as to why governments shouldn’t be too quick to minimize environmental assessment processes. For further reading…– Robyn Allan’s latest discussion of the Gateway pipeline is here.– Kevin Logan documents Christy Clark’s position prior to her latest desperate call for
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Evening Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Robyn Allan notes that there’s plenty of weakness in Christy Clark’s position on the Gateway pipeline. But Barbara Yaffe writes that Clark has little choice but to stick to at least the requests she’s made so far – and Vaughn Palmer points
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Vaughn Palmer discusses the unfortunate gap between the outrages that may lead to a government being pushed out of power, and a new government’s ability to actually reverse what’s been done. Which, a propos of nothing, makes it rather important to push
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your weekend. – Will Hutton discusses how the increasing gaps in economic equality are leading to radical differences in opportunity – with the U.S./U.K. push toward private schooling serving as a particular source of exclusion: (T)he middle class of whatever ethnic background is spending more on
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
Assorted content for your Sunday reading. – Bruce Johnstone reminds us that much of Stephen Harper’s low-wage, anti-worker agenda has been rather poorly hidden for a long time: Everything from growing trees for farmers to processing immigration applications to inspecting meat to examining evidence in criminal investigations, all of the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Alex Himelfarb laments the Cons’ dismantling of a progressive state in Canada. But lest we lose all hope, Annie Lowrey reports on the Piketty/Saez economic work that’s paving the way for fairer taxes in the U.S. And Kelly McParland has to admit
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your weekend. – pogge rounds up last week’s news on the Robocon front – while the outside attack on the NDP’s leadership vote suggests that the block-the-vote crowd isn’t limiting its work to general elections. – Meanwhile, Dave connects some dots between the Harper Cons, the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – pogge points out that the Cons’ response to the perception that judges aren’t fully onside with their efforts to impose top-down control has been to eliminate the judiciary’s ability to ensure fair results: Where the institutions of government have put constraints on
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Paul Krugman comments on how Republicans’ cheerleading for total corporate control – which has of course been matched at every turn by Canada’s Cons – has resulted in their declaring war on any policy which could possibly result in environmental improvements: (T)he
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Good riddance
At long last, B.C.’s HST has met its end. Vaughn Palmer reminds us why, while Iglika Ivanova looks at what comes next.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On hollow victories
Sean Holman raises the possibility that Christy Clark and the B.C. Libs may be no better off if they manage to hang onto the HST in the province’s ongoing referendum than if they lose the vote. But I wonder whether it’s worth going a step further.If th…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading.- In case anybody held out hope that the Harper Cons might follow up on their residential school apology with some concrete action to change First Nations relations for the better, here’s the predictable result: a…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.- Yes, plenty of attention is being paid to Canada’s weak ranking when it comes to innovation. But it’s well worth noting that the failure isn’t for lack of billions of dollars being tossed down a sinkho…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that (with a B.C. flavour) for your Tuesday reading.- Yes, the CCPA’s report showing that taxes in British Columbia are downright regressive is stunning enough on its face. But the real story may lie in the response of the province’s finance m…
Continue reading