It’s one thing to lose a referendum on a regressive tax that came in on a lie, that was a tax shift from businesses to real human beings, and that removed PST exemptions on real necessities or awesome products like cloth diapers, kids shoes, food, smoke alarms, child car seats, bikes and fire extinguishers. But it’s […]
Continue readingTag: Class War
the woodshed: Anarchy in the U.K.
Some thoughts and links on the riots across England:Not everyone in London is either a rioting, firebomb-throwing yob looter or an authoritarian “send-in-the-army” wannabe aristocrat. Some of them are good community minded people. Let hope these people…
Continue readingThe Circus of Greed: the Political Economy of Ratings Agencies
Would be hard not know that the S&P downgraded the US today. What is less well known is why it is further evidence of the circus of greed that is the American financial and political system. First, read this post … Continue reading →
Continue readingIIlicit money flows
Not really into re-blogging articles but this essay effectively puts money laundering and corruption into context. It is useful for explaining key processes in the ‘the web of secrecy, collusions and the players that drive and sustain the world o…
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Austerity Leads to Suicide Rate Increase
Friday’s Vancouver Sun had a short item that you might have missed, “Suicides up, road deaths down due to recession.” It’s in the bottom corner of page B5: Suicides rates rose sharply in Europe in 2007 to 2009 as the financial crisis drove unemployment up and squeezed incomes, with the worst hit countries like Greece […]
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: “Plus ça change, plus c’est la meme chose”; or, how to ideologically re-structure your student society: a beginner’s guide: the SFSS CUPE Lockout
By Joel Blok, originally published here. This summer five years ago, the Board of Directors of the SFSS suspended its office staff, barring them from entering their offices and sending them home. This past Thursday, a different board issued a lockout notice to its office staff, preventing them from work. In 2006, the rhetorical justification […]
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Thoughts on a Filibuster
Can I get a “WOW”? Just look at all those women! I couldn’t stop grinning as woman after woman after woman rose and spoke. What happened to all the arrogant white dudes? Oh, they’re posturing and questioning. I guess someone noticed as the past few questions have been lobbed by female CPC MPs. Aside from […]
Continue readingTowards an adult conversation about Canadian labour markets
Have you ever heard the urban legend about how such and such generation of Canadians are lazier than the past generation? Or the One about how this generation just does not want to work and why we need to make … Continue reading →
Continue readingA little perspective on GDP growth or does policy matter?
These are odd times. Not one policy seems to get floated these days which does not include in the tag line that it will be good for economic growth. And it is not just tax cuts for the rich or … Continue reading →
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: The Social Determinants of Health
(Note: This post contains a portion of the talk that I gave last month at the 16th International Conference of the Association of Psychology and Psychiatry for Adults and Children in Athens). Research has now clearly established that economic, and social variables – more than individual or family behavior – are the most salient factors […]
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Once upon a time on the bald prairie
In 1935 a group of farmers in Regina, Saskatchewan pooled their savings, re-mortgaged their farms and build the Consumer Co-operative Refinery Limited (CCRL). CCRL is the oldest and largest co-operative in the energy sector in Canada, controlled by Canadian members, and is one of the oldest energy co-operatives in the world. Who knew? This story […]
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Corporate Personhood Alert!
We have to spend some time this week carefully watching BC business playing good cop and bad cop. The good cop is opposing the idea of a corporate tax rate of zero, while the bad cop says that corporations should be able to vote, like real human beings. British Columbia Chamber of Commerce president John […]
Continue readingThe love which dare not speak its name
People who would want to avoid reading my dissertation or anything about neoliberalism but nonetheless would like to have some idea about what has been going on in the world of public policy and economic policy in particular ought to … Continue r…
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Nestlé’s War on Breastfeeding Mothers Takes Shameful New Turn
Infant formula is a medical necessity for those who are unable to breastfeed their infants. There are a host of medically sound reasons why a mother, in conjunction with her physician would choose to utilize infant formula in lieu of breast milk. The regulated manufacturing of infant feeding products has come a long way in […]
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Tonight, Live-Blogging COPE’s Re:Imagine Schools
I’ve already written about how much I’m looking forward to COPE’s Re:Imagine Schools event tonight. I’ll be live-blogging the event as well. You can scroll down to watch or participate in the live-blog! The COPE Education Committee Presents: Re:Imagine Schools – Defending the Potential of Public Education Imagine a chance to take a step back […]
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Tory, PC, Harper, Conservative, Alliance, or Reform Majority?
I know what’s in a name. Soon, everyone will. We’ll have a long time with this new Harper Government. Bets are now on in terms of what he’ll name the Government of Canada this time. He’s tried “Canada’s New Government” and “The Harper Government” already. But when I read analysis of the election results, it […]
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: A Snapshot of the Vulnerable Underclass of Foreign Workers in Canada
There are lots of ways to look at Canada’s checkered history with immigration. Europeans welcome, French to a lesser degree after they lost a war or something, Chinese railroad workers, the Komagata Maru, internment of Japanese-Canadians, residential schools and a variety of abuses of the First Nations who “we” tend to treat as lesser people, […]
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: How Can We Get Better Public Schools?
Well, the first thing we can do is carve out some time to ponder, imagine, dream, inhale, exhale, chat, brainstorm, breathe some more, and forget for a minute that we’ve had a decade of hard-core privatizing, de-funding of the public education system. It’s hard to imagine a better future when we’re constantly fighting the latest […]
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: A Compendium of My Prime Minister Layton Posts
I’ve enjoyed writing four pieces about the Prime Minster Layton concept in the last 2.5 years. Originally, it was a wishful thinking hyper long-shot in a prorogation crisis at a time when the Liberals had no firm leader. Then in June 2010 it was a curiosity when polling indicated a Jack Layton-led coalition with the […]
Continue reading