Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – Paul Krugman offers a warning about Donald Trump’s immediate moves to normalize corruption and cronyism as the foundation of his administration. And the New York Times’ editorial board points out that corporations are enabling Trump’s false claims with the expectation that they’ll be
Continue readingTag: Paul Krugman
Accidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that to start your 2017. – Ideas examines how the assumptions underlying far too much economic theory have produced disastrous real-world results. And Harold Meyerson writes that research is proving that skeptics of corporate-driven free trade have been right all along. – Gary Younge writes that the rise
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – Paul Krugman writes about the dangers of Donald Trump’s crony capitalist infrastructure plan. And Tom Parkin warns us that Justin Trudeau’s Canadian equivalent is headed toward exactly the same results: A private infrastructure bank means paying more for financing. It means getting less
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Wildrose whip condemns racist imagery after the fact? That dog won’t hunt! Jason Nixon should have walked away
PHOTOS: A shot from the Twittersphere of Saturday’s anti-carbon-tax protest in Red Deer (grabbed from @IamBunbury). Below: A close-up from the photo of a person who appears to be Jason Nixon speaking to one of the protesters, and a photo of Mr. Nixon from a Wildrose event in 2015. Below
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading.- Paul Krugman rightly points out that it’s to be expected that Republican establishment figures would line up behind Donald Trump since he shares their top priority of handing still more money to the richest f…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: NDP environmental policies: Who’re ya gonna believe? Mark Carney or Rick Strankman?
PHOTOS: Bank of England Governor and Alberta Premier Rachel Notley at yesterday’s brief news conference in the provincial Legislature Building. (CBC Photo) Below: Rick Strankman and Michael Bloomberg. Who’re ya gonna believe, huh? Mark Carney, form…
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Notley NDP make pigs fly again with support for Climate Leadership Plan
When the Alberta government released its Climate Leadership plan in November 2015, I said that Premier Rachel Notley and Environment and Parks Minister Shannon Phillips had made pigs fly by uniting a coalition of industry leaders and environmental l…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading.- Scott Vrooman rightly makes the point that increased wealth at the top tends to splash outside a country’s borders rather than trickling down. And CBC News reports on how that process has been facilitated by KPM…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week.- Carol Goar writes about the need for Canada’s federal government to rethink how we view taxes. And Simon Wren-Lewis tries to explain the resilience of austerian ideology even as it fails every test in the real world….
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.- David Dayen examines the different treatment granted by businesses to well-connected elites compared to everybody else, and says it’s understandable that voters are looking for leaders who understand t…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week.- Paul Krugman writes that we’re far closer to a major energy transformation than many people realize – but that public policy decisions in the next few years may make all the difference in determining whether …
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading.- Paul Krugman discusses the connection between concentrated wealth and extreme anti-social political behaviour:Wealth can be bad for your soul. That’s not just a hoary piece of folk wisdom; it’s a conclusi…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to start your new year.- Paul Krugman points out that as tends to be the case, the U.S.’ modest increase in high-end tax rates in 2013 managed to produce both more fair taxation and strong economic growth.- But Michael Hudson notes tha…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.- Paul Krugman reviews Robert Reich’s upcoming book, with a particular focus on the connection between corporate power and growing inequality:…Reich makes a very good case that widening inequality larg…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: If we’d been paying attention, perhaps we wouldn’t be so shocked by the U of C’s corporate-influence scandal
PHOTOS: The University of Calgary’s School of Public Policy, conveniently located adjacent to the oil corporations’ towers in downtown Cowtown. Below: The writers of the notorious Alberta separatist Firewall Manifesto, which then-premier Ralph Klein wisely tossed into the garbage; Calgary School alumni and Firewall signa-Tories Stephen Harper, Tom Flanagan and
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Branko Milanovic writes about the connection between concentration of wealth and income inequality, making the argument that broader ownership of capital itself may make for an important means of levelling the economic playing field. – But of course, the current trend is in
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Message to the Wildrose Party: The NDP won and you’re going to need breakfast!
PHOTOS: The Wild Rose Breakfast Special. Just one of the many compensations of getting an early start on your day. Below: Infrastructure Minister and NDP House Leader Brian Mason, the NDP’s point man on early rising legislators; Wildrose Leader Brian Jean; and Interim Conservative Party of Canada Leader Rona Ambrose,
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Reaction to this afternoon’s Budget Speech is bound to be completely predictable
ILLUSTRATIONS: A mosaic planned for some future Legislature renovation showing the Opposition and Government positions on the budget. Below: A scene from the Kabuki theatre in which actors portraying Premier Rachel Notley and Finance Minister Joe Ceci contemplate the books left them by the PC government … or something. Below
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – David Climenhaga sees Jeremy Corbyn’s resounding victory in the Labour leadership race as compelling evidence that progressive hope can win over centre-right fearmongering, while Michael Laxer takes some lessons away for Canadian politics. And Paul Krugman notes that there’s a reason why
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Give a thought to Alberta’s approaching budget day: there’s little to gain and plenty to lose from ‘debt free’ government
PHOTOS: Former premier Ralph Klein, now elevated to sainthood by the neoliberal cargo cult, celebrating the retirement of Alberta’s debt in 2004, never mind the mess the infrastructure was in. Below: Alberta Finance Minister Joe Ceci, Canadian economist Jim Stanford and Wildrose Finance Critic Derek Fildebrandt, with, bottom, his old
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