Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Gar Alperovitz suggests in the wake of Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century that it’s long past time to reconsider who controls capital – and make a concerted effort to democratize that control: The name of the game — Piketty’s book fairly
Continue readingTag: environment
Politics, Re-Spun: How the Federal NDP Plans to Alienate Eco-Voters
Mulcair wants to out-Liberal the Liberals led by the charismatic son of a charismatic Liberal prime minister. He will fail: “I think what Canadians want are people who are realists, who understand for example the importance of our extractive industries and the creation of jobs but they also want to
Continue readingThings Are Good: Edmonton Has a Massive Waste to Biofuel Facility
The province of Alberta is usually only mentioned on this site when people are campaigning against the tar sands and the destruction of the environment. Today though, the capital of Alberta, Edmonton, has done something rather great. Edmonton is home to a large industrial-scale waste processing plant that converts what
Continue readingThings Are Good: Time for an Ocean Cleanup
We recent looked at Illinois banning microbeads, which will cut back on plastic pollution in large bodies of water. But what about the plastics that are already in the oceans? That’s where Ocean Cleanup comes in. Right now, the young organization is raising $2 million through crowd funding to do
Continue readingPushed to the Left and Loving It: The Harper Government’s Eight Years of Standing Up For Canada
I came across the Conservative Party of Canada’s 2006 election platform: Standing Up For Canada. Stephen Harper is the first and only leader of this Party that was formed in 2003. In the introduction, he outlines the CPC’s priorities with a list of promises. Let’s see how many he kept
Continue readingCowichan Conversations: Rafe Mair: Why I’m for Massive Civil Disobedience
We are indeed in for the struggle of our lives.The Enbridge pipeline proposal is just one arm of the current energy frenzy that has gripped Alberta and British Columbia, but even alone it could cause irreperable harm on an unimaginale scale. Rafe Mair is as knowledgable as any in BC
Continue readingCowichan Conversations: Here is Dan Murphy’s ‘Enbridge Video’ that the Province yanked
Many of you will remember Dan Murphy’s brilliant video satires that ran in the Vancouver Province. Well that is until Enbridge, who buy a zillion dollars worth of misinformation advertising, demanded that the pretend newspaper yank this video and they did. Vancouver Province editors recognize that balance is a good
Continue readingTHE CANADIAN PROGRESSIVE: Harper Will Regret Approving the Enbridge Pipeline: Forest Ethics
Vancouver-based environmental group Forest Ethics says Harper’s approval of the politically toxic Northern Gateway pipeline may cost him the 2015 election. The post Harper Will Regret Approving the Enbridge Pipeline: Forest Ethics appeared first on THE CANADIAN PROGRESSIVE.
Continue readingNorthern Insight: Who does the Government of BC serve?
I wrote previously about Narrows Inlet, a wilderness area 60 kilometres by air from Vancouver. I repeat Joan and Soren Bech’s submission to the Environmental Assessment Office because it is articulate and it relates to a major theme at this blog. The theme is a rhetorical question, “Who does the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Andrew Jackson reviews the OECD’s economic recommendations for Canada – featuring a much-needed call for fair taxes on stock options: Special tax breaks for stock options primarily benefit senior corporate executives, especially CEOs of large public companies who are commonly given the right
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Will Enbridge’s pipeline ever get built?
You have to wonder why the Harper government bothered with process at all. It’s like there was never any doubt that Enbridge’s Northern Gateway pipeline would get approved. But historians may look back on this moment as the beginning of the end of pipeline politics. Opposition to Enbridge’s Northern Gateway
Continue readingTHE CANADIAN PROGRESSIVE: First Nations vow to fight Enbridge’s Northern Gateway project
“We are prepared to go to unprecedented lengths to conserve and protect our territories and waters from heavy oil” – First Nations Leadership Council by: First Nations Leadership Council | Press Release | June 17, 2014 Coast Salish Territory (Vancouver, BC) – On December 19, 2013 the Joint Review Process released its report on
Continue readingreeves report: Ottawa approves $5.5 billion Northern Gateway pipeline
THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT has approved the $5.5-billion Northern Gateway pipeline project from Enbridge, to carry 525,000 barrels of crude oil each day from Bruderheim in northern Alberta to the port town of Kitimat along British Columbia’s rugged Pacific Coast. Prime Minister Stephen Harper signalled his approval for the project late Thursday after the controversial pipeline received
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: !!!***BREAKING***!!! THE FIX IS STILL IN!!!
Plenty of commentators theorized this week that the Cons might pay some heed to public opinion when it comes to the Northern Gateway pipeline. But let’s remember where this process all started: from the beginning, the Cons consistently decreed that nobody was permitted to say “no”. And we can hardly
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Following up on this morning’s post, George Monbiot discusses the need for a progressive movement which goes beyond pointing out dangers to offer the promise of better things to come: Twenty years of research, comprehensively ignored by these parties, reveals that shifts
Continue readingArt Threat: Montreal Fringe: Kitt & Jane guide us through the ecological apocalypse
Kitt & Jane: an interactive survival guide to the Near-Post-Apocalyptic Future is environmental activist theatre disguised as charming comedy and shadow play. Created by the team behind the award-winning Little Orange Man, Kitt & Jane sees Kitt, still quietly mourning her grandfather’s death, teamed up with Jane (real name: Lucas)
Continue readingSaskboy's Abandoned Stuff: A Plan Designed To Fail Is No Plan At All #skpoli
“While it’s not immediately clear what impact the Obama (climate change) plan will have on the province, the government of Saskatchewan has taken measures to address the greenhouse gas issue through the development of programs and policies that will reduce our CO2 emissions,’ Wall said. “We have our (GHG) emissions
Continue readingThings Are Good: Chilean Dam Project Broken Up Thanks to Activists and Locals
Activism works, just ask the Chilean communities that stopped a hydroelectric dam from being built. The dam was going to cause a lot of local ecological havoc with little actual gain to the local populace. The Chilean government has backed down from building the dam and the communities that were
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Hey, BC: Want More Jobs? Dump the LNG and Pipelines!
Well, I found yet another [like this] study showing how many MORE jobs we’d get by moving to a post-carbon energy infrastructure and dumping LNG, tarsands, pipelines and all the other Mordor Industrial Complex BC and Alberta are embracing. Not only is dumping the carbon energy infrastructure essential to do
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: Desmond Tutu and the “Animals in War” Memorial
Everywhere you turn in London there’s a statue or monument commemorating an epic battle or a long dead sovereign. While interesting, none is as compelling as the Animals in War memorial. It reduced me to tears. The Animals in War memorial consists of two mules struggling to approach a gap
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