This and that for your Sunday reading.- Larry Elliott discusses how the rise of Donald Trump and other exclusionary populists can be traced to the failed promises of neoliberal economics:The fact is that the US middle class, which in Britain we would c…
Continue readingTag: populism
Accidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading:- Ross Douthat (!) discusses the distinction between actual cosmopolitanism, and the global elitism that’s instead come to dominate international power relations:Genuine cosmopolitanism is a rare thing. It require…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week.- In the wake of yesterday’s Brexit vote, David Dayen points out how the failure of technocratic policy left many voters believing they had nothing to lose in abandoning the European Union. Dawn Foster highlights the r…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your weekend reading.- Lana Payne writes about the need for a Bernie Sanders in Canada to highlight and oppose the privilege of the wealthy few:It is in this context of blatant unfairness — rules for the rich and rules for…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week.- Edgardo Sepulveda writes about the role of the federal government in combating inequality – while noting that Canada has gone in the wrong direction over the past few decades. And Michal Rozworski points out that we’…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Assorted content to start your week.- Roshini Nair reviews Jim Stanford’s re-released Economics for Everyone, with a particular focus on the need not to give up on the prospect of change for the better: Although economics might be the dismal science, t…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Martha Friendly examines what a “national child care program” actually means. And Jim Stanford makes a compelling economic case as to why Canada needs one: In the case of early childhood education, however, this standard claim of government “poverty” is exactly backwards. Because
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Robert Reich describes how U.S. voters are rejecting the concept of a ruling class from both the left and the right – while noting that it’s vital to get the answer right as to which alternative is worth pursuing. And Owen Jones
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Tessa Jowell writes that we need to treat inequality as a disease which can be cured through effective public policy, but the Star points out that the Cons have instead gone out of their way to make it worse. Fair Vote Canada
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that to start your year. – Ian Welsh comments on the challenges we face in trying to turn wealth increasingly concentrated in the hands of a few into a better world for everybody: The irony is that we have, again, produced a cornucopia. We have the potential to
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Listen Up. Does This Sound Familiar?
It seems to be an unavoidable part of neoliberalism – the sense of being ruled, not governed by consent. It’s the degradation of democracy, the detachment of the rulers from the ruled that is paralleled by the compression of the political spectrum so that one party becomes largely indistinguishable from
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Polly Toynbee looks at how the UK is now treating children in need as investment opportunities to be exploited by investors, rather than people to be assisted. And Mark Taliano writes that privatization is a problem rather than a solution when it comes
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – Alyssa Battistoni writes that a universal basic income could go a long way toward solving environmental and economic problems alike by placing a focus on sustainable quality of life rather than increasing consumer consumption: If overconsumption is actually the problem, we can’t fix
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
Assorted content for your Sunday reading. – D.L. Tice writes that it’s becoming more and more difficult for the right to ignore the spread of income inequality – and the reality that only public policy, not faith in the market, can produce a more fair distribution of income. Which is
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Paul Krugman explains how one’s political values figure to affect one’s view of evidence as to the success or failure of a policy: (T)he liberal and conservative movements are not at all symmetric in their goals. Conservatives want smaller government as an end
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
This and that for your weekend reading. – The Star offers an editorial on the continued increase in wage inequality in Canada, highlighting the complete lack of any connection between accomplishment and executive compensation: (T)he country’s economic performance has changed dramatically. In 2007, when Mackenzie began, the Canadian economy was
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Some Low-Hanging Fruit
Feeling singularly uninspired this morning, I offer a tidbit of the obvious: ‘Ford Nation,’ that much vaunted segment of the population that stands by their man no matter what, is under-educated and from lower-income backgrounds. Since I am not one of those that the Fords and their right-wing fellow travellers
Continue readingThe Ranting Canadian: Peter Kormos memorial on May 11, 2013 in Thorold, Ontario
Peter Kormos memorial on May 11, 2013 in Thorold, Ontario: Click on the above link for details, and see my last post for more information about his life, which ended far too soon. If you see grey boxes above, click on one of them to see photos of Peter.
Continue readingThe Ranting Canadian: Last weekend, Canada lost a beloved, well-respected, honest,…
Last weekend, Canada lost a beloved, well-respected, honest, persuasive, gruff-voiced, hard-working, non-conformist, friendly, principled, down-to-earth man of the people who drank and smoked, wore cowboy boots, stood up for the little guy and was re-elected several times. No, I’m not talking about that asshole Ralph Klein, whose merits and accomplishments
Continue readingThe Ranting Canadian: I downloaded this image from Facebook, so thanks to the person…
I downloaded this image from Facebook, so thanks to the person who created it.
To anyone not familiar with the skinhead subculture (other than the racist, far right fringe that the sensationalist media presents as representative of the entire subcultur…