Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Julia Doubleday offers a reminder that any remotely responsible definition of “living with COVID” would include doing everything reasonably possible to upgrade air quality. And Dylan Matthews discusses the prospect that UV light may help to reduce the spread of viruses generally –
Continue readingTag: Ed Broadbent
Alberta Politics: Edmonton mayor to ask city councillors to declare housing and homelessness emergency on Monday, ruffling UCP feathers
In a blog post published yesterday, Edmonton Mayor Amarjeet Sohi said he has called a special meeting of City Council Monday to ask for a declaration of a housing and homelessness emergency in the city. Edmonton Mayor Amarjeet Sohi (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). The United Conservative Party Government was clearly
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – The Star’s editorial board weighs in on the reality that wishful thinking isn’t a substitute for responsible public health measures as another COVID wave builds up, while the Globe and Mail rightly criticizes the politicians acting like the pandemic is over as the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Mariana Mazzucato offers her take as to how to set our economy onto a positive course in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. And Ed Broadbent and Brittany Andrew-Amofah discuss how to fund a full and just recovery. – Erica Alini reports on
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Maxwell Smith, Ross Upshur and James Downar warn us against mistaking a temporarily flattened curve for a final victory over the spread of COVID-19. – Leilani Farha questions how it’s possible for people to help fight the coronavirus by staying at home
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Ed Broadbent and Andrew Jackson highlight how among its other advantages, a national pharmacare program would prevent workers from being tied to jobs by a need to preserve coverage through work: On top of the unnecessarily high and rising cost of private
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Jim Coyle lists a few of the lies voters tell themselves around election time. And the Angus Reid Institute counts the large number of voters who cast a ballot for a party they don’t actually support – with the Trudeau Libs as
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Jeff Spross discusses the effectiveness of a wealth tax both in generating revenue, and in reducing inequality. David Leonhardt notes that a wealth tax will actually boost the economy by putting to use assets which are otherwise idle (if not being used for
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Yanis Varoufakis writes that the tendency of capitalism toward stagnation signals the need for greater public input into economic decisions. And Branko Milanovic discusses how the attitude that politics should be governed by greed has undermined the trust between citizens and governments necessary
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Brian Topp, NDP strategist who led Rachel Notley’s 2015 war room, describes what Jagmeet Singh must do this year to win
With a federal election looming this fall, mainstream pundits have already written off the federal New Democratic Party and its leader, Jagmeet Singh, relegating Mr. Singh to history’s discard bin and declaring the party to have already returned to perpetual third-party status. Maybe they shouldn’t, suggests long-time NDP political strategist
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Evelyn Forget makes the case for a national basic income which would provide a more stable fiscal base for Canada’s provinces as well as its citizens. And Dennis Raphael writes about the social murder resulting from the wanton destruction of income supports and
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Ed Broadbent examines how Doug Ford’s platform (such as it is) would only further enrich the wealthy, while causing catastrophic results for everybody else: Just imagine waking up on Friday morning and having to hear the phrase “Premier Doug Ford” for the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Who saw Donald Trump coming? Not Simon Reisman, that’s for sure, but maybe Ed Broadbent and John Turner
PHOTOS: Simon Reisman’s business card. Below: Mr. Reisman, chief Canadian negotiator of the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement in a screenshot of a blurry CBC archival broadcast; a recent shot of Brian Mulroney (Photo: Mike Feraco); Toronto Star political columnist Thomas Walkom; and lobbyist Robin Sears. Circa 1986, I recognized Simon
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Ed Broadbent discusses how Bernie Sanders offers an example to emulate – and in some cases a source of ideas well beyond what Canada has implemented so far: It was clear to everyone watching that Canadians, in fact, have a few things
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Steve Burgess points out that we shouldn’t be the least bit surprise by the latest news of politically-connected billionaires managing to tilt the tax system in their favour. Ed Broadbent calls for a much-needed end to tax policy that favours the wealthy in
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Assorted content to start your week. – Jim Hightower writes that the risk of technology displacing workers is ultimately just one instance of the wider problem of corporate greed. And the New York Times is examining how the principle of total corporate control is the basis for the Trump administration’s
Continue readingThings Are Good: Respecting Human Rights When Negotiating Trade Deals
money Donald Trump ran a campaign that championed the need to renegotiate the North American Free trade Agreement (NAFTA) to better help Americans. Trump’s erratic behaviour means we won’t know if NAFTA will ever be renegotiated, however the need to talk about trade in a new lens is needed (of
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Clive Hamilton discusses the accelerating calamity of climate change which we’re allowing to happen: Our best scientists tell us insistently that a calamity is unfolding, that the life-support systems of the Earth are being damaged in ways that threaten our survival. Yet in
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Leadership 2017 Links
The latest from the federal NDP’s leadership campaign… – Marie-Danielle Smith reports that Jagmeet Singh is laying the groundwork to join the race. And Steve Paikin offers his take as to what that might mean for the current candidates – while also raising the (seemingly unlikely) prospect that Thomas Mulcair
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – In advance of this year’s Progress Summit, Ed Broadbent writes that burgeoning inequality threatens our democracy: Inequality matters. Promises must be kept. It’s not enough for our government to celebrate the diversity of our country but not enact policies that head off
Continue reading