It would be an act of monumental self-deception for Canadians to believe that our country is an island set above the rage bubbling across the world.
Continue readingTag: donald trump
Accidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Nicholas Kristof writes about Donald Trump’s choice to put the most virulent anti-worker cronies imaginable in charge of U.S. labour policy. David Climenhaga weighs in on the UPC’s laughably biased committee charged with the task of driving down wages for service workers. And
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Kenney Conservatives find the perfect policy panel to push the working poor back to penury
If pushing the working poor back into penury is your policy objective, the United Conservative Party led by Premier Jason Kenney has found the right collection of ringers to stack its “expert panel” on rolling Alberta’s minimum wage back to pre-NDP levels. Labour Minister Jason Copping introduced the panel yesterday
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Diogenes, Leadership and SNC-Lavalin.
There is no time left for what might have been. Canadians are going into an election when what we so desperately want to say is ‘None of the above.’ Are we condemned to face a future of failure? Are we helpless? Have we found there is no honest man? Justin
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta discourse may still be mired in climate change denial, but the rest of the world is moving on
Public discourse in Alberta may still be mired in climate change denial, but the rest of the world is changing and changing fast. Even the New York Times, which along with much of the mainstream media in the United States could be accused until recently of seriously underplaying the climate
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Larry Elliott writes that a corporate-centred model of globalization is unlikely to survive the Trump regime. And Jeff Spross proposes an alternative which allows for people to be free and capital to be controlled, rather than the other way around. – But
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Joel Connelly reports on a new B.C. study showing the breadth and depth of the effects of a climate breakdown. Reuters examines the threat of water bankruptcy looming over a quarter of the Earth’s population – including a substantial part of the
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: This is not news.
Reading other blogs can be a sometimes painful mission. You do it to see what others are writing about, to study their style (or lack thereof) and to see what answers they offer. Mind you, after each experience, I come away with the feeling that the social experiment of the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – The Washington Post reports that July 2019 set new records as the hottest month ever measured on Earth. David Suzuki offers a reminder of the catastrophic consequences of failing to put and end to our climate breakdown. And Roger Harrabin warns against
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – Steven Greenhouse discusses how the U.S.’ economy is rigged against workers. And Eric Levitz writes that Donald Trump’s giveaway to the rich worked only as a scam against the rest of the country. – Matthew Townsend and Scott Lanman point out that minimum
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Noah Smith comments that while we shouldn’t necessarily try to adjust GDP for other necessary elements of individual and social well-being, we should avoid treating it as a catch-all measure in assessing policy choices: GDP does have plenty of flaws, even as
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – CBC News highlights how cost-of-living issues look to play a key role in Canada’s federal election. And Jerry-Lynn Scofield points out that current asset valuations and economic assumptions are based on an entirely unsustainable combination of public, private and corporate debt loads.
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: The Brits are crazy too.
There is a pattern emerging. What particular hell we are heading for might still be a mystery but I fear the pace is accelerating. What you would have thought impossible a few years ago is to-day’s horror. To make matters worse, there is no discerning a rational path for the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Guest Post by Olav Rokne: How Alberta missed a chance to fix the inherent problems of geographically based voting
The troubling rise of Prime Minister Boris Johnson in the United Kingdom and President Donald Trump in the United States can both be traced to the inherent problems of geographically based electoral districts. Before Alberta’s election in April, we had a chance to fix those flaws. Instead, the work of
Continue readingBabel-on-the-Bay: Mr. Trump’s Fascist Following.
It was a heavy-set woman who could be in her 50s in the crowd, as the camera scanned it, that caught my eye and had also caught the attention of the camera person. She had an enraptured look on her face as she screamed: “Send her back.” It was just
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Can Boris Johnson do what some of history’s most notorious villains failed to do – destroy the U.K.?
Is it likely Boris Johnson will accomplish something neither Napoleon nor Hitler could manage – to wit, destruction of the United Kingdom? Perhaps it’s not likely. States like trees, even badly broken ones, possess a powerful life force. But it’s definitely now within the bounds of possibility. The Royal Navy,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Osita Nwanevu describes the higher-brow forms of bigotry and wilful ignorance being pushed by U.S. Republicans for upper-class audiences. And Kate Aronoff discusses the racial undertones of yet another wave of red-baiting. – Meanwhile, David Climenhaga highlights how Canadian right-wing governments are
Continue readingWarren Kinsella: The Hidden Conservative Voter
They’re hidden. They showed up, however, at Brexit. They showed up in the U.S. presidential race in 2016. They showed up in Alberta in 2019, and Ontario in 2018, too. They’re the THCV – The Hidden Conservative Voter. And they’re changing politics. June 2016: shocking just about everyone, 52 per
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Why are Conservative-run Canadian provinces turning down federal cash? The answer’s in the Republican playbook
When Prime Minister Justin Trudeau observed back on April 16 that the Ontario provincial government led by Premier Doug Ford was throwing roadblocks in the way of Ontario municipalities accessing federal money for needed transportation infrastructure, Conservatives responded with angry denials, and not just in Ontario. The prime minister had
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: Trump’s “Go Home” Tweet
Ms Soapbox found herself organizing the sock drawer this morning. She blames this burst of domesticity on Donald Trump. She’ll explain how this ties back to Alberta politics in a moment, but first a quick recap of the most recent Trump blowout. The Tweet Last week Mr Trump tweeted
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