This and that for your Thursday reading.- Barbara Yaffe writes about the continual rise in food bank use and the underlying political choices which have brought it about:(I)n the last decade food banks have been helping Canadians through both good time…
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Accidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Frances Russell discusses how the Cons have corporatized Canadian politics: In fact, elevating corporate rights over the rights of citizens and their democractic institutions seems to be the Harper government’s core agenda. Its aggressive “free trade” stance has led to agreements with
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Stephen Maher follows up on this week’s Supreme Court ruling on Etobicoke Centre by pointing out where we should be most worried about our electoral system: Fraudulent voting is far from the biggest problem facing our democracy. Disengagement is. Voting rates are declining
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – The Toronto Star’s Public Editor Kathy English discusses the wall being built around information by the Harper Cons. But at least as interesting to me is the Cons’ determination to put up roadblocks in the way of information which can obviously be obtained
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material to end your Saturday. – Jim Stanford looks in detail at the aftereffects of free trade with the U.S., and finds rather little to cheer: In sum, the promise that free trade would induce more trade, productivity growth, and higher incomes (following traditional Heckscher-Ohlin mechanisms) is not remotely
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
Assorted material to end your weekend. – Chrystia Freeland comments on the self-destructive nature of elite protectionism: (E)ven as the winner-take-all economy has enriched those at the very top, their tax burden has lightened. Tolerance for high executive compensation has increased, even as the legal powers of unions have been
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – Jim Stanford reviews the effect of NAFTA (and associated corporatist policy choices) on Canada’s economy: Quantity of exports: In the mid-1980s, before Brian Mulroney and Ronald Reagan inked their deal, Canada’s exports to the United States accounted for 19 per cent of Canadian
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Leadership 2013 Roundup
Assorted news from the Saskatchewan NDP’s leadership campaign over the past few days… – Ryan Meili explained his choice not to start unveiling policy just yet by suggesting that leadership starts with listening – and the list of user-submitted ideas on his website looks to be expanding nicely to signal
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Althia Raj reports on the Cons’ concerted effort to undermine organized labour in Canada (along with anybody else who might object to putting the interests of dirty oil and dirty money above the needs of citizens): Behind the rhetoric about “union bosses” and
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
This and that to end your Saturday. – As pointed out by Paul Krugman, Kathleen Geier recognizes an obvious possible cause of a declining life expectancy for some less-wealthy Americans: I will offer an alternative hypothesis, one which is not explicitly identified in the Times article: inequality. In the U.S.,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Evening Links
Assorted content to end your day. – Common Dreams discusses the prevalence of inherited wealth among the U.S.’ richest individuals (as pointed out by a report by United for a Fair Economy): Forbes claims that their list of the 400 richest people is ‘the definitive scorecard of wealth’ in the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On diverging paths
Earlier this morning, I noted that the NDP is developing on a promising line of economic messaging – highlighting the Cons’ determination to place the interests of the wealthy and privileged over those of mere working Canadians. And I’d expect that principle to factor into the NDP’s foreign policy as
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Evening Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Michael Lewis writes a fascinating piece on Barack Obama’s life as president. And I’d think it’s particularly noteworthy to consider Obama’s self-discipline both as a model for self-improvement in theory, and as a risk factor in opening up a perception gap between
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Stuart Trew comments on the Cons’ utterly implausible claims to try to impose the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement with the EU without the slightest bit of public scrutiny: CETA will also most certainly give European firms the power to challenge and
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Eric Liu and Nick Hanauer theorize that we should discuss the economy as a garden rather than a machine: A well-designed tax system — in which everyone contributes and benefits — ensures that nutrients are circulated widely to fertilize and foster growth. Reducing
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Lori Wallach discusses the corporate coup underlying the Trans-Pacific Partnership which the Cons are so eager to force on Canada: (T)rade is the least of it. Only two of TPP’s 26 chapters actually have to do with trade. The rest is about new
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on how CETA and especially the TPP are serving as ever more glaring examples of the Cons’ willingness to give away everything Canadians value as part of ideologically-driven trade negotiations for no real economic gain. For further reading…– Scott Sinclair and Michael Geist have recently commented on the TPP
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for a sunny Sunday. – Paul Wells offers some theories as to why the Cons haven’t yet launched attack ads against Thomas Mulcair. But I’d think the more important aberration is the fact that they did do so against Bob Rae before he ever became the Libs’ permanent
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Tom Korski nicely captures the essence of the Cons’ omnibus attack on the environment (along with anything that stands in the way of a cheap and dirty buck): C-38 is a gift for oil and gas lobbyists. It repeals 20 years of environmental
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Parliament in Review – April 27, 2012
Friday, April 27 saw another day of relatively non-contentious debate on the main bill up for discussion in the House of Commons. But there was plenty of reason to question why the focus would be as narrow as it was. The Big Issue That main bill was the Cons’ elder
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