Aaron has already listed and commented on Thomas Mulcair’s shadow cabinet assignments. But there are a few additional points worth adding into the mix. First, while others have pointed out Nathan Cullen’s promotion to House Leader, the exact choice of positions is very much worth emphasizing. As the leadership candidate
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Accidental Deliberations: Wednesday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – In an excerpt from the Occupy Handbook, Paul Krugman and Robin Wells discuss how a right-wing obsession with exacerbating inequality led to the U.S.’ disastrous response to the 2008 crash: How did America become a nation that could not rise to the biggest
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 readingLeft Over: We’ve Only Just Begun…
Emperor Steve and his nightmare circus clowns have deemed it the ‘cost of doing business’ to redress the pushback that his Enbridge dirty deal has caused..necessary and desirable to offer up to profit mongering the possible destruction of the West Coast’s environment..and we are, happily, prepared to take him on.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – When even free-trade warrior Barrie McKenna can only respond incredulously to a message campaign on behalf of the wealthy, you know it’s gone too far. So here’s McKenna answering the contrived outrage over the NDP’s proposal for a slight increase in income tax
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Danielle Martin discusses the importance of federal involvement in Canada’s public health care system: Whose job is it to co-ordinate health-care reform in Canada? Canadians expect our federal government to play that role. We want to know that wherever we live, we will
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
This and that for a sunny Saturday. – Paul Wells discusses the clash shaping up between the Cons and the NDP: Some 57 per cent of respondents said they’re dissatisfied with the Harper government, compared to 36 per cent who like it. Last month’s federal budget drew more unsatisfied reaction
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – John Cassidy neatly contrasts growth in the postwar period against that in recent decades – with the former seeing a “picket fence” growth pattern where all segments of society benefited roughly equally, while the latter produces a “staircase” effect (aside from an utterly
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Lawrence Martin comments on the growing resonance of inequality as an issue for Canadian voters. But the most telling sign may be less the Ontario NDP’s steps to highlight the need for more progressive taxation (as Martin recognizes), but the McGuinty Libs’
Continue readingRusty Idols: Wild Rose promises to waste your tax dollars…
…by attempting to discriminate against gays and women seeking reproductive services, guaranteed to cause legal challenges equally guaranteed to be decided against the Alberta Government after expensive legal battles with preordained results. So called ‘Conscience Rights’ have been decisively adjudicated. People in government licensed positions like Marriage Commissioners MAY NOT
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Evening Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Frances Russell comments on the Canada which the Harper Cons are determined to destroy. But the more important point looks to me to be less any theory of constitutionalism than the desire to have governments be as ineffective as possible at all levels:
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On areas of agreement
There’s plenty of room for debate as to whether Peter Julian’s budget filibuster should be seen to have its greatest impact in empowering Canadians who don’t hold a seat in Parliament, or in limiting participation by other elected representatives. But it does seem worth noting that while even a couple
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Alison nicely debunks the Cons’ latest Robocon talking points. Paula Boutis offers her own suggestions to strengthen Elections Canada in investigating vote suppression. And Glen McGregor and Stephen Maher report that the Cons have been working on funneling federal money through a
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Susan Delacourt notes that while the NDP’s leadership convention points out some of the risks of online voting, the real problem lies in the people working to block democracy through any available means: While those who use computers have become accustomed to the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your weekend. – Karl Nerenberg reported on Marc Mayrand’s Robocon testimony, featuring some much-needed discussion of what can be done to improve the Canada Elections Act to ensure fair elections rather than creating an incentive for electoral fraud: Mayrand fretted to the Committee that there are
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – If there’s any lesson we should all be able to draw from the past decade in Canadian politics, it’s that anything can happen. But it’s still rather amazing to see Gerald Caplan get hopeful about the NDP’s prospects of forming a social-democratic government:
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Yes, there was huge news in Robocon yesterday, with Chief Electoral Officer Marc Mayrand rightly declaring the Cons’ fraudulent vote suppression to be “absolutely outrageous” while sharing the news that reports of wrongdoing have now come in from two-thirds of all of Canada’s
Continue readingRusty Idols: Damn Peasants!
The Globe and Mail sniffs in outraged offense at the peons daring to inconvenience or insult their betters. Consider contacting the Globe and Mail and expressing how you feel about this display of patrician disdain. Try to avoid any tempting four letter words. Hat tip to Dawg sdnxry5z7g
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On standards of disproof
In keeping with my own admonition, I won’t spend too much time amplifying the messages the Cons want to send in attacking NDP leader Thomas Mulcair. But I do think it’s worth pointing out how the main theme could prove to be self-defeating. One of the points which worked well
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Stephen Maher and Glen McGregor report that the Council of Canadians is leading the charge in challenging election results which may have been influenced by Robocon. And perhaps the most noteworthy point as to how the move may shine a spotlight on
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