Assorted content to end your week. – Glen Hodgson and Brenda Lafleur explain how Canada’s lower and middle classes alike have been left out of any economic growth as a result of increased inequality: We believe the more accurate interpretation is that after worsening in the 1980s and 1990s, income
Continue readingTag: bob hepburn
Accidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Arthur Haberman argues that our universal public health care system helps contribute to a more democratic society: There is something that political philosophers — those like Tocqueville and Mill in the 19th century — have come to call living democratically. By this it
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: The Dominoes of Democracy – Part 2
What is one of the chief effects of the Harper regime’s preference for an ideologically-based policy model over one premised on logic, facts and empirical evidence, as explored in my earlier post? The decline, perhaps even the demise, of a healthy democracy in which citizens are engaged and informed participants,
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: The Dominoes of Democracy – Part 2
What is one of the chief effects of the Harper regime’s preference for an ideologically-based policy model over one premised on logic, facts and empirical evidence, as explored in my earlier post? The decline, perhaps even the demise, of a healthy democracy in which citizens are engaged and informed participants,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, building off of my previous analysis on the current positioning of Canada’s federal parties. For further reading, see:– Bob Hepburn and Carol Goar on the purpose and effect of attack ads in general; and– Andrew Coyne on the Cons’ particular brand of personal attack, featuring some suggestions to reduce
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: The Scourge of the Undead
While there was much talk in the House of Commons yesterday about how to prevent a ‘zombie apocalypse,’ in Canada, Bob Hepburn has his own solution on how to deal with the scourge of the undead: hold a referendum on abolishing the Senate. Noting that it costs well over $100
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Steven Hoffman highlights the Cons’ utter refusal to recognize that foreign aid – as defined by global treaties – doesn’t mean the same thing as corporate giveaways: Reports and commentary on Canada’s new foreign aid policy reveal the extent to which international development
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: The Perilous State of Democracy in Canada
Over the past year I have written several posts on the woeful state of democratic participation in Canada, a state I am convinced is at least in significant part due to the debasement of our traditions engineered by the Harper regime. Contempt of Par…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week.- Rick Salutin offers an important take on the U.S. election by pointing out that the Occupy movement and its focus on inequality laid the groundwork for Barack Obama’s re-election:The aftermath to the bailouts was the…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Ish Theilheimer highlights why the corporate right is so eager to snuff out organized labour – and why progressives need to fight back: Since the 1980s under Reagan, US Republicans have worked to “de-fund the Left,” going after advocacy groups, university student
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Evening Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Michael Lewis writes a fascinating piece on Barack Obama’s life as president. And I’d think it’s particularly noteworthy to consider Obama’s self-discipline both as a model for self-improvement in theory, and as a risk factor in opening up a perception gap between
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Glen McGregor and Stephen Maher keep up their reporting on Robocon by noting that Elections Canada’s trail seems to have gone cold with the use of an unsecured wifi connection to hide the identity of Pierre Poutine. But as Susan Delacourt points out,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Paul Buchhelt offers five reasons why the extremely wealthy should pay more in taxes. But if we can anticipate some conflict over that idea, there’s stronger evidence than ever that the public is rather united behind one side. – Bob Hepburn notes that
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: On Corruption and Political Disengagement
Last night I had a long telephone conversation with my good friend Dave, who lives in Winnipeg. Like me (and probably more so), Dave has a keenly developed sense of justice and fair play, and when those values are violated, he is outraged. Last evening, as he was telling me
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Amy Minsky uncovers some suspicious-looking spending patterns underlying Robocon, while Postmedia also points out that election results in at least a couple of seats may plausibly be subject to challenge. Emma Pullman offers some more details on the Manning Centre’s voter suppression
Continue reading