CTV reports on the funnelling of money from SNC-Lavalin into the Cons’ coffers. And we shouldn’t be surprised to see that connection in light of the Cons’ attitude toward corporate wrongdoing. But it’s especially worth noting what’s missing from the Cons’ denials of involvement: Elections Canada records reveal that 10
Continue readingTag: corruption
Accidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – A Gandalf Group poll finds (PDF) that Canadians have come to perceive and expect a disturbing level of self-serving action by our political leaders. And while Dale Smith is right to note that we’ve largely limited the most obvious forms of corruption,
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: The Big Easy – Easy On Rapists
There’s always been a seedy undercurrent to New Orleans – everything from street hustlers to corrupt politicians. It’s part of the flavour of the place. Now it turns out the Big Easy has been going easy on rapists thanks to a municipal detective squad that couldn’t care less. … a city
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: A Government Corrupted
There’s no trace of hyperbole in denouncing Stephen Harper as the Great Corrupter. He is corrupt and he corrupts whatever he touches whenever and however it suits him. The proof is pretty much everywhere but a shining example is the National Energy Board. Take it from Marc Elieson, an energy
Continue readingParchment in the Fire: Corrupt Spanish politics faces shock therapy from an angry electorate | Miguel-Anxo Murado | Comment is free | The Guardian
Corrupt Spanish politics faces shock therapy from an angry electorate | Miguel-Anxo Murado | Comment is free | The Guardian. Being “between Pinto and Valdemoro” is an old Spanish saying that refers to being in trouble. Now with the number of politicians being investigated for corruption in Spain nearing
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on the Cons’ presumption that any individual who breaches the social contract must be punished with a total lack of freedom – and their curious lack of any similar principle when it comes to corporate wrongdoing. For further reading…– I’ve dealt with issues relating to mandatory minimum sentences plenty
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
Assorted content for your Sunday reading. – The Tyee’s recent series on important sources of inequality is well worth a read, as Emily Fister interviews Andrew Longhurst about precarious work and Sylvia Fuller about the role of motherhood. – David Cole asks just how corrupt U.S. politics have become, while
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Bert Olivier is the latest to weigh in on Paul Verhaeghe’s work showing that the obsessive pursuit of market fundamentalism harms our health in a myriad of ways: What does the neoliberal “organisation” of society amount to? As the title of the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – George Monbiot discusses how a market-based society makes people unhealthy in a myriad of ways – and how it’s worth maintaining our innate reluctance to value everything and everybody around us solely in terms of dollar values: The market was meant to emancipate
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Robert Green looks at Quebec as a prime example of selective austerity – with tax cuts and other goodies for the wealthy considered sacrosanct, and well-connected insiders being paid substantial sums of public money to tell citizens they’ll have to make do
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Monica Potts responds to the big lie that increasing inequality and perpetual poverty are necessary – or indeed remotely beneficial – as elements of economic growth: Hanauer and Piketty inspire these broadsides because they are challenging, in a far more aggressive way than
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Linda McQuaig discusses how a burgeoning wealth gap is particularly obvious when it comes to retirement security: Quaint as it now seems, not long ago this was considered a good basic plan: Work hard all your life and then retire with a
Continue readingParliamANT Hill: ConservAntive SenAntor faces 31 charges
Inspired by this headline: http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/mike-duffy-faces-31-charges-including-bribery-fraud-breach-of-trust-1.2709500
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Thomas Frank interviews Barry Lynn about the U.S.’ alarming concentration of wealth and power. Henry Blodget thoroughly rebuts the myth that “rich people create jobs”. And David Atkins goes a step further in discussing how hoarded wealth hurts the economy in general
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Simon Enoch discusses the costs of turning over a profitable system of public liquor stores to corporate control – as Brad Wall has finally admitted to wanting to do: A privatized liquor market is very likely to evolve into an ‘oligopoly’, where only
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Joseph Stiglitz offers his suggestions (PDF) for a tax system which would encourage both growth and equality: Tax reform…offers a path toward both resolving budgetary impasses and making the kinds of public investments that will strengthen the fundamentals of the economy. The most
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Assorted content to start your week. – Jim Stanford looks into the fine print of the Hudak PCs’ assumptions about corporate tax slashing and finds that even their own numbers show that most of the money gifted to corporations would be thrown away (emphasis added): On second reading there are
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: What Would Jesus Occupy?
13 When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. 15 So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple
Continue readingthe disgruntled democrat: Thanks But No Thanks Quebec: Take My Ballot And Shove It
Well, I have decided not to vote in this charade of an election. My principle reason is that my vote does not count — it is totally ineffective — because I live in a region where the same political party, the Quebec Liberal Party (PLQ), has taken all of the
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Say what? After 36 years, secret Alberta Tory slush fund comes to light
Senior Alberta Progressive Conservative Party officials and guards remove election campaign funds from the vaults of the “Tapcal Trust.” Actual PC party officials may not appear exactly as illustrated: Below: PC Party Executive Director Kelley Charlebois; Public Interest Alberta Executive Director Bill Moore-Kilgannon. So, there’s this law in Alberta that
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