Monday, May 7 saw another day largely dominated by debate on the Cons’ omnibus budget bill. The Big Issue Plenty of MPs rightly focused on the Cons’ move to combine so many disparate types of legislation into a single behemoth of a bill. Don Davies remembered his first instruction as
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Accidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Robert Cross and Glen McGregor point out how “Pierre Poutine” covered his tracks in the course of sending out fraudulent robocalls to direct voters away from the correct polls. And it’s particularly worth noting how blatantly the entire scheme was planned to conceal
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Erin points out that there’s a relatively simple cure for Dutch disease – just as long as provincial governments are willing to put citizens ahead of resource extractors: (S)ince resources are priced in American dollars, the higher exchange rate further reduces provincial resource
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Miscellaneous material to start your week. – The Cons’ attacks on the environment and its defenders are starting to attract plenty of unwanted attention, with the Globe and Mail editorial board weighing in as the NDP, the other opposition parties and the environmental movement join forces to reject the utter
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Jared Bernstein discusses the effect of raising taxes on the highest-income households, featuring this in particular: Growth and jobs. History shows that higher taxes are compatible with economic growth and job creation: job creation and GDP growth were significantly stronger following the Clinton
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Yes, the individual examples are worrisome enough. But the real takeaway from Sarah Schmidt’s report on the CFIA’s testing of food products for sale in Canada is that more often than not, consumers can’t trust what’s on the label: CFIA allows for a
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Leadership 2012 Roundup
Assorted news and notes from the NDP’s leadership campaign as we approach today’s final debate… – Niki Ashton pointed out how the NDP should be able to tap into the desire for democratic decision-making that once motivated the Reform Party before it was turned into a top-down organization under the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your weekend reading. – Tabatha Southey speculates as to the inevitable results when the Cons try to summon the entire Internet to answer for its political activity. – David Olive points out that for anybody who wants to buy into “tax freedom day” messaging, the corporate sector
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Erin nicely summarizes Don Drummond’s report on Ontario’s finances. But it’s worth noting that leaving aside Drummond’s own choice not to follow the instruction, anybody looking for a thorough analysis of Ontario’s fiscal realities should be able to discount the report in
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Parliament in Review: November 25, 2011
Friday, November 25 saw the House of Commons debate two NDP ideas: one to allow for meaningful debate and consideration of legislation in Parliament, the other to give effect to a principle the Cons are looking to punt to a committee in the apparent hope that it’ll never surface again.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your weekend reading. – Stephen Maher reminds us that the Harper government now lecturing us about the need to attack social programs because of a federal deficit is the same incompetent group that caused the deficit in the first place through reckless tax slashing and vote-buying
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Miscellaneous material to end your weekend. – As Thomas Walkom notes, it’s an open question as to who will take up the cause of defending universal public health care in Canada – but easy to figure out who poses the greatest threat to it: Writing in The Globe and Mail
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – I’d planned to post on the sheer arbitrariness of the Cons’ insistence on eliminating a regulation for any new one they implement. But Erin gets there first: At best, this rule is a gimmick. At worst, it will delay or prevent the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Spin of convenience
Following up on one rebuttal to the Cons’ shilling for the tar sands on the Gateway pipeline, let’s point out one other area where the Cons’ attacks apply far more strongly to their own side than to the voices they’re looking to silence. Here’s Joe Oliver’s criticism of the First
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