Mourning the senseless tragedy. Today I was very impressed when Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada, broke with his almost long-held position of not visiting Lac Megantic. While he and his wife took the opportunity to participate in staged political photo ops helping out with the Calgary floods, he has
Continue readingTag: Corporations
Politics, Re-Spun: Ikea’s Union-Busting Lockout in Richmond, BC Reaches Two Months
Is Walmart Ikea’s labour relations mentor? Ikea, that family-friendly darling of home decor and Swedish innocence is trying to break its union, Teamsters Local 213. They have locked out their Richmond, BC workers for two months now, while deciding to bargain in reverse: Start with a pathetic offer, then as
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Terrace: Regulating Housing Dignity Is Far Easier Than You’d Think
How to Research a Slumlord! In this era of hyper neoliberalism, we are so used to tax-cutting governments chopping regulations off the books to allow the Blessed Free Market to guide human existence. This caveat emptor mentality, however, means lots of vulnerable, marginalized and economically precarious people are hung out
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: New, Better Jobs Building a Green Energy Infrastructure
Let’s go post-carbon and transform Big Carbon jobs into green jobs! We are so addicted to carbon-based energy: oil, gas, coal, LNG plants, fracking, pipelines, tanker spills. It gets so discouraging sometimes. But something that the post-carbon energy infrastructure advocates are missing out on, I think, is promoting more of
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Groups demand that U.S. companies reject Canadian tar sands
by: Sierra Club Canada | Press Release: Corporate Climate Campaign led by Sierra Club and ForestEthics Gains Momentum San Francisco, CA, June 2, 2013 – Fifty-eight organizations, led by the Sierra Club and ForestEthics, released an open letter today demanding that companies take climate action. The letter calls on U.S. corporations with trucking
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Canada Day +1, Our Quiet Genocide
A banner drop during last night’s Canada Day celebration in Toronto’s Mel Lastman Square. (Photo: IdleNoMore.ca) Canadians are so nice. We have such a happy, positive self-concept. This makes it quite hard to address the quiet genocide of first peoples that our nation has conducted for centuries. What is genocide?
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Pro-business Harper Conservatives coddling tax havens, tax cheats
By: Obert Madondo Twitter: @Obiemad An Alberta businessman is included in a massive online database of secret tax-haven names released to the public on Friday by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. David Ghermezian, the president of the West Edmonton Mall, is linked to a British Virgin Islands-registered company called Regal Mega Malls Development Corp,
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Corporate Hypocrites Gone Wild: Syncrude Edition
Let’s say that you’re one of the world’s largest producers of synthetic crude and also Canada’s largest single-source producer of crude derived from oil sands. Imagine that you are also the biggest greenhouse gas emitter in Alberta! (“Psst, we’re working on being the biggest in all of the nation, baby. Don’t count
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Top Priorities of the 21st Century
If I were asked what I felt were the top priorities facing human beings today, in the 21st century, I would have to say there are four that top the list, in my mind. 1. Halt the global corporate coup. Defeat the corporate war on democracy, which is now escalating
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Profits Before People: Richmond Ikea Lockout Enters Day 17
Generating enough media spin to rival a jet engine at take off, the management and PR folks at Ikea Canada want you to believe that their poor little corporation is being held hostage by greedy, soulless union workers in Richmond. Woe. Pity poor Ikea. It’s tough being a multi-national
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Dissent or Terror: New Report Details How Counter Terrorism Apparatus Was Used to Monitor Occupy Movement Nationwide
By: Center for Media and Democracy | Press Release: MADISON, WI – May 20 – DBA Press and the Center for Media and Democracy today released the results of a year-long investigation: “Dissent or Terror: How the Nation’s Counter Terrorism Apparatus, In Partnership With Corporate America, Turned on Occupy Wall Street.” The
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive | News & Analysis: In Texas, An Activist Climbs Flagpole, Hangs Banner Denouncing Alberta Tar Sands
LyondellBasell recently announced its plans to nearly triple its tar sands refining capacity from the Keystone XL pipeline as protests escalate across the continent By: Tar Sands Blockade | Press Release: HOUSTON, TX – An activist with Tar Sands Blockade climbed a 50 foot flagpole in front of LyondellBasell’s downtown Houston office
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: The Pidgin Picket, the Housing Crisis and the State
The Role of The State in Gentrification, the Housing Crisis, and its Ability to Relieve or Maintain the Current Situation by Rachel Goodine Pidgin, a new fine-dining restaurant located on Vancouver’s Downtown East Side, moved in to the neighbourhood on February 1 of this year, prompting plenty of controversy. It’s
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Free Speech and the Privatization of Public Space
Donald Smith was protesting a sign at Glenmore Landing in Calgary’s southwest Sunday that bans political demonstrations. [CBC] The privately owned parking lot near the prime minister’s constituency office asserts that protesting is prohibited. On the surface, this looks like the prime minister is impeding the constitutional rights of expression
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: GroupThink ReSpun: The Death of Hugo Chavez
Hugo Chavez died of cancer on March 5, 2013. He represented an ideological pushback against neoliberal globalization. He pursued a progressive hemispheric trade agenda. He raised oil royalties dramatically to improve the social capacity of people in and around Venezuela. He revolutionized and democratized Venezuela’s constitution. He attracted the ire
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Jeremy Hammond: Aaron Swartz & the Criminalization of Digital Dissent
It is not the “crimes” Aaron (Swartz) may have committed that made him a target of federal prosecution, but his ideas – elaborated in his “Guerrilla Open Access Manifesto” – that the government has found so dangerous. By Jeremy Hammond – #18729-424 | Metropolitan Correctional Center, Feb. 20, 2013: The tragic
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Excessive corporate rights in Canada-EU CETA trade deal unacceptable to Canadians and Europeans
Transatlantic Statement Opposing Excessive Corporate Rights (Investor-State Dispute Settlement) in the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) By Trade Justice Network | Feb. 5, 2013: BRUSSELS, BELGIUM and OTTAWA, ONTARIO and MONTREAL, QUEBEC – Labour, environmental, Indigenous, women’s, academic, health sector and fair trade organizations from Europe, Canada and Quebec
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: We don’t want your dirty gold: corporate donations and the university
The following is a piece written by contributor Kevin Harding and guest contributor Natalie Gan. The piece was written in 2010, but is being published on Politics Respun for the first time. The issue of controversial corporate donations to public universities is a live one, with the Munk School at
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Aaron Swartz, Intellectual Property and the Public Good
Should academic work be locked up like Disney[tm] artifacts? I’ve been quite inspired by this very good analysis of the context surrounding Aaron Swartz’s suicide. As news spread last week that digital rights activist Aaron Swartz had killed himself ahead of a federal trial on charges that he illegally downloaded
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Canadian Labour Congress says corporations hoarding cash, paying fat compensation to CEOs
CLC report: Corporate Tax Freedom Day is January 30 – Big businesses hoard cash from tax giveaways, not investing in jobs by Canadian Labour Congress | Jan. 29, 2013 OTTAWA – A research study by the Canadian Labour Congress shows that CEOs in Canada could be dancing in their suites to celebrate
Continue reading