Assorted content to end your week. – Frances Russell weighs in on the Cons’ continued contempt for democracy: The Conservatives under Stephen Harper are running an effective dictatorship. They believe they are quite within their rights to muzzle Parliament, gag civil servants, use taxpayer money for blatant political self-promotion, stand
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Accidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on how the CFIA’s inability to do anything about tainted horse meat exemplifies the problems with weak and under-resourced regulators. For further reading…– Again, Mary Ormsby’s original story is here. – Andrew Nikiforuk’s take on the appointment of oil lobbyist Gerald Protti to set up Alberta’s new regulatory system
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Stephen Hume rightly mocks the Fraser Institute for using its tax-exempt status to whine about individuals who don’t earn enough to pay income taxes. But I’ll take the opportunity to reiterate a point I’ve made before: progressive governments in particular will do far
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – George Monbiot proposes a basic income as one of the great ideas needed to challenge corporatist orthodoxy: A basic income (also known as a citizen’s income) gives everyone, rich and poor, without means-testing or conditions, a guaranteed sum every week. It replaces
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Lori Theresa Waller provides her own take on the Canadian Foundation for Labour Rights’ study on labour rights and inequality: In the 1970s, all provinces used the simple card check system, whereby an employer must legally recognize a union if the majority of
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Sunny Freeman reports on the Canadian Foundation for Labour Rights’ study into the effects of anti-labour legislation: The CFLR argues that [right-to-free-ride] laws would contribute to greater income disparity by undermining union strength and rights to collective bargaining, which they say leads
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Paul Krugman discusses how a myopic focus on slashing taxes and services figures to cheat future generations out of desperately-needed social structure: You don’t have to be a civil engineer to realize that America needs more and better infrastructure, but the latest “report
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Brendan Haley explains why the Cons’ let-them-build-pipelines economic approach is doomed to fail from the standpoint of prosperity as well as that of sustainability: There is a certain spirit of defensiveness and vulnerability behind the Conservatives’ economic choices. Ideologically incapable of admitting that the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Book Review: The Blaikie Report
Among other highlights of the Saskatchewan NDP’s leadership convention this month, I was able to meet and chat with longtime NDP MP (and later MLA) Bill Blaikie, who attended in large part to introduce party members to The Blaikie Report. And I appreciate the opportunity to review the book –
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Tanya Gold discusses how the UK Cons – like other right-wing parties around the globe – are seeking to minimize the effectiveness of government by declaring that anybody who can benefit from social support is inherently undeserving: How many benefits have been unfairly
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives has unveiled its alternative federal budget – which highlights the choice between the Cons’ needless austerity, and the 200,000-300,000 extra jobs which could be created alongside important social improvements which could be brought about through well-placed
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
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 readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Paul Adams highlights how the Cons and their anti-social allies have spent decades trying to convince Canadians that it’s not worth trying to pursue the goals we value – and how the main challenge for progressives is to make the case that a
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On social roles
The work (PDF) of the Saskatchewan Election Study in analyzing public views of unions is worth a read generally. But it’s particularly worth noting that the element of union activity which the public considers to be most valuable is also the part facing the most regular attacks from Brad Wall
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – The Star’s editorial board highlights why our elected representatives should be countering the effect of precarious employment (rather than exacerbating them as the Cons have done): Simply put, programs like Employment Insurance and the Canada Pension Plan were created back in the days
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On misdirection
Shorter Konrad Yakabuski: If only unions had let themselves be brow-beaten into accepting less wages and security for their members, then surely our corporate overlords would have granted greater wages and security to everybody!
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Reflections on democracy
There is a global war on democracy underway, and if it is not addressed, our future will be bleak. But let us start with the ground work of democracy, and follow from there. Simple majority rule is accurately described as the tyranny of the majority; hence the need for constitutional
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
That and that for your Sunday reading. – Alex Himelfarb weighs in against gratuitous austerity by pointing out the dishonest cycle of excuses used to push destructive policy: (T)he consequences of cuts are increasingly visible, first for the most vulnerable: aboriginal communities struggling to meet basic needs, higher tuitions and
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Chrystia Freeland points out why productivity doesn’t provide an accurate picture of economic development if it merely results in increased inequality rather than shared benefits: Productivity and innovation, the focus of policy makers and business leaders, no longer guarantee widely shared prosperity. “Digital
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Americans Now Primed for WWIII
(Gallup: Staggering 99 Percent of Americans See Iran’s Nuclear Program as ‘Threat’ Americans See Civilian Program as a Bigger Threat Than North Korea’s Actual Nukes by Jason Ditz, February 20, 2013) ”A grim new poll from Gallup shows an overwhelming majority of Americans, indeed 99 percent of them, believe
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