Collingwood has joined other local municipalities asking the province to revamp its Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (MFIPPA; a guide from the Information and Privacy Commissioner to the Act is also available here) to make the process more restrictive and less open. While some of those
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Alberta Politics: There was a whole lotta scrambling going on, 24/7 … can the 2015 PMO security breach whodunit be solved?
PHOTOS: Former Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper, at right, somewhere in Iraq in 2015 (Photo: Screenshot of Global News video). Below: The very model of a modern major general, although not necessarily a Canadian one (Photo: Wikimedia Commons), and the Canadian defence minister of the day with some ghostly military
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Documents show B.C. ‘Climate Leadership Plan’ was cooked up in Calgary boardroom of powerful petroleum industry lobby
PHOTOS: British Columbia’s beautiful Legislature Building in Victoria – not, as it turns out, where the province’s climate policy is set! Below: CCPA-BC’s Shannon Daub, former B.C. Liberal premier Christy Clark (Photo: Wikimedia Commons), B.C. NDP Premier John Horgan, and environmentalist Tzeporah Berman. Using documents obtained through a Freedom of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Damning ‘carding’ statistics can’t be explained away – they’re evidence of systemic racism
PHOTO: Bashir Mohamed of Black Lives Matter Edmonton speaks in front of the Edmonton Police Service downtown headquarters yesterday. Below: Some powerful charts showing carding practices in Edmonton. It’s too much. The numbers are just too high, the discrepancies in treatment too wide. It’s just too difficult to credit the
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The Sunshine List Case hits the court #nlpoli
The public sector unions’ attack on freedom of information is finally in front of a judge. The unions want to block disclosure of the names of public servants in response to a request from the Telegram’s James McLeod for a list of public service positions in which the person holding the
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The value of inquiry #nlpoli
Information is good.Information is the basis of knowledge.Information is also power.That’s why people who have information don’t want others to have it.The power that comes from knowing is why some politicians, government officials and others, historic…
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Just How Many BC Government Comms Staff Are There?
Below are all the job titles of all the comms staff in the BC Government Communications and Public Engagement bodies as of last week. Count with me! 🙂 There are 278 people! 278. That’s more than a few. The records include folks in these two areas: Government Communications: which tends to
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Mansbridge Revisited
The other day I posted a report on Peter Mansbridge speaking out against cuts to the CBC and the unprecedented secrecy that pervades public institutions under the current federal government. I gave some praise to the broadcaster for finally speaking out about important issues that potentially affect all of us.
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Peter Mansbridge Speaks Out
Readers of this blog will know that I am a frequent critic of both the CBC and Peter Mansbridge. Both ‘institutions,’ in my view, often fail to live up to the standards ethical and brave journalism demands. They have been far too passive, even complicit in, the Harper regime’s scorn
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: The BC Government Doesn’t Know Who Graduates With What. What?
I know. It’s true. The BC government’s Ministry of Advanced Education has no data on who has graduated with what from BC universities in the last 40 years. I know, hey. You’d think it would be interesting to them, even because maybe some of them were curious. Maybe some of
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Facebook Is the New AOL/Compuserve Big Brother
The evolution of the decay of Facebook privacy. The late, great Neil Postman once wrote that we’d more likely voluntarily embrace the fascism of Huxley’s Brave New World than Orwell’s 1984. The corporate version of this is the crack-like addiction a billion people have to the Facebook. But it’s worse
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Online Surveys, No Longer Much Fun
Once upon a time, it was fun to take online polls. For lots of reasons. But one of my favourites was to watch how poorly polls could be constructed. Once, six years ago, Innovative Research Group put a racist poll into the field. It included questions about whether I had
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Class War: US$11.5 Trillion Hidden in Tax Havens
Which tax haven is right for you? Class war is alive and well. I have this rose-coloured, nostalgic dream of history. Once upon a time we emerged from feudalism with a democratic revolution. All were equal. Well, most. But the hope of democracy was to rid the world of the
Continue readingAlberta Diary: The real reason upgrading bitumen in Alberta ‘doesn’t make sense’
A bitumen processing plant near Fort McMurray, back in the day. Below: An actual bitumen bubble. The government of Alberta is “desperate” to get the province’s bitumen resources to market, as its media echo chamber relentlessly informs us. And it says it’s equally desperate to pop the “Bitumen Bubble,” the
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Aaron Swartz, Intellectual Property and the Public Good
Should academic work be locked up like Disney[tm] artifacts? I’ve been quite inspired by this very good analysis of the context surrounding Aaron Swartz’s suicide. As news spread last week that digital rights activist Aaron Swartz had killed himself ahead of a federal trial on charges that he illegally downloaded
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Operation Last Resort: Anonymous Declares ‘War’ On U.S. Government
Hacktivist collective threatens massive WikiLeaks-style exposure of potentially-damaging secrets. by Guest Blogger | Jan 27, 2013 In response to the death of Internet activist , Reddit programmer and extraordinary hacker, Aaron Swartz, Anonymous has declared “war” on the U.S. government with an operation code-named “Operation Last Resort”. Late Friday the hacktivist collective hacked
Continue readingCanadian ProgressiveCanadian Progressive: Anonymous: The Betrayal Of Wikileaks
Last week, the hacktivist collective Anonymous dumped WikiLeaks. Anonymous accuses WikiLeaks’ beleagured founder Julian Assange of turning the whistle-blowing website into a one man “Julian Assange show”. Below is the full text of Anonymous’ statement explaining the divorce: Greetings World – In December of 2010 Anonymous came to the defense of and began supporting
Continue readingeaves.ca: On Being Misquoted – Access Info Europe and Freedominfo.org
I’ve just been alerted to a new post out on Freedominfo.org has quotes of mine that are used in way that is deeply disappointing. It’s never fund to see your ideas misused to make it appear that you are against something that you deeply support. The most disappointing misquote comes
Continue readingLeft Over: Pussy Riot? Can you Say Assange?
A well-known British politician, who is considered a bit of a ‘radical’ in the best sense, in the UK, has launched a defence of Julian Assange, pointing out that, should Assange be convicted of what he is accused of, there would be no penalty in Britain, since his alleged acts
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Would I Lie To You?
Faith can be a marvelous thing, one that people take strength from as they go about their daily lives. One meaning of faith, as offered by Oxford Dictionaries online, encapsulates this idea: strong belief in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual conviction rather than proof. However, there is
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