Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Leo Panitch questions the “responsible capitalism” theme which is being used by Ed Miliband in lieu of a more significant alternative to unfettered market dogma: It is most unlikely that Miliband’s call for “responsible capitalism” will refresh genuine political debate let alone galvanise
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Accidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Rick Perlstein observes that Ronald Reagan’s most lasting contribution to American politics may be his admonition not to recognize flaws or past sins which might require serious responses – and that democratic discourse in the U.S. and elsewhere has yet to recover: (T)he
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Katrina vanden Heuvel criticizes the U.S. Democrats’ move away from discussing inequality by in favour of platitudes about opportunity for the middle class. And while Matthew Yglesias may be correct in responding that the messaging change hasn’t resulted in much difference in
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 readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – The Globe and Mail joins the chorus calling for Canada to welcome more citizens, rather than exploiting cheap and disposable workers. But Bill Curry reports on yet another corporate lobby group demanding that the Cons actually expand the flow of temporary labour
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Matthew O’Brien is the latest to pick up on the connection between pre-transfer income equality, redistribution and sustainable economic growth: Redistribution overall helps, and at least doesn’t harm, growth spells. That’s because the positive effects of less inequality add to or offset the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – David Atkins emphasizes the need for progressive parties and activists to discuss big ideas rather than settling for the path of least short-term resistance: Both the poor and the middle class feel threatened and increasingly pessimistic. Opinions of elite institutions across the board
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
Assorted content for your Sunday reading. – Zoe Williams interviews George Lakoff about the need for progressive activists and parties to work on changing minds rather than merely pursuing an elusive (and illusory) middle ground: (T)he left, he argues, is losing the political argument – every year, it cedes more ground
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
This and that to end your weekend. – Paul Luke comments on the general stratification of workers into three groups: professionals facing extended hours and stress at a single job, service-sector workers juggling multiple jobs at more than full-time hours, and people struggling to find work at all. But it’s
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – In keeping with the theme of this week’s column, the Star-Phoenix questions the Wall government’s choice to neglect existing school infrastructure. And Lana Payne’s message about how leaders react in a crisis also looks to be closely intertwined with the need to plan
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Ish Theilheimer writes about the opportunity progressives should recognize in the scandals engulfing Rob Ford, Stephen Harper and other conservative leaders: (W)hile you’d think the (Ford) situation would be a golden opportunity for Toronto left-wingers to win back the public, this isn’t necessarily
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On core products
It may not come as much surprise that I thoroughly disagree with Murray Mandryk’s paean to corporate protection agreements. But his take on the CETA does signal one point worth highlighting. Last week, my column dealt with the shift toward seeing politics as a matter of marketing and microtargeting, rather
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Nadir Khan interviews Linda McQuaig about her choice to run for the NDP in Toronto Centre – and confirms that McQuaig’s commitment to progressive politics fits neatly with her participation in a caucus: NK : You mention that you’ve been outspoken and taken
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Jordan Brennan and Jim Stanford put to rest any attempt to minimize the growth of inequality in Canada: (I)ncome inequality has reached a historic extreme. Inequality was high during the 1920s and 1930s (the “gilded age”), but fell sharply during the Second World
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your weekend reading. – Katie McDonough reports on new research showing the devastating effects of poverty on an individual’s ability to plan and function: According to researchers at Harvard University and the University of British Columbia, people living in poverty experience reduced cognitive functioning as a result
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On efficiencies
Nick Falvo offers one response to Tom Mulcair’s latest comments on taxes. And I certainly won’t argue with the position that it’s utterly bizarre to see the leader of a progressive party declare that he’s perfectly happy with the restrictive revenue streams (and associated lack of social programs) set up
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Michael Harris nicely describes what the Cons are actually doing with power while pretending to be innocuous fiscal managers: The PM and his government are not good managers. The nauseating repetition of the claim that the Tories know what they’re doing with
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Chris Lehmann discusses the destructive impetus behind the ever-present austerity scolds: In their new book The Body Economic: Why Austerity Kills, Stuckler and Basu show distressingly consistent increases in such key public-health indicators as suicides, heart disease, alcoholism and HIV infection in societies
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – Thomas Walkom, Dan Leger and Michael Harris write about the sketchy surveillance programs in place on both sides of the 49th parallel. But there may be an opportunity to make common cause with the 1% in criticizing constant intrusion on personal privacy, as
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Doreen Massey observes that our political vocabulary has largely been hijacked by corporatist language: At a recent art exhibition I engaged in an interesting conversation with one of the young people employed by the gallery. As she turned to walk off I saw
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